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June 10, 2026
Ontario has announced more funds to help communities deal with the risks associated with old and inactive oil and gas wells. Natural Resources Minister Mike Harris revealed the province was investing an additional $7.8 million in several provincial programs associated with dealing with the wells, bringing the 2026 commitment to nearly $11 million.
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June 10, 2026
Canadian real estate lawyers are accustomed to handling closings end to end. Under Canada’s Torrens-style land titles systems, the government register provides statutory assurance of title, and closings largely involve inter-law-firm fund exchanges. When your client purchases real property in the United States, however, the process is fundamentally different. There is no government guarantee of title. Instead, title evidence and settlement are private-market functions performed by title insurers and escrow/settlement agents. Understanding these differences is essential to properly advising your client on a U.S. real estate acquisition.
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June 09, 2026
Torys has added Paul Logan, Larissa Svekla and Alina Kaiser to its commercial real estate team in Calgary, the firm says. Logan joins as a partner, Svekla as counsel and Kaiser as an associate.
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June 09, 2026
The British Columbia Court of Appeal has ordered a new trial in a dispute over lot purchase agreements signed in 2016, finding that a trial judge erred in concluding that the contracts remained enforceable until a development condition was satisfied eight years later.
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June 08, 2026
In a recent decision, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice (Commercial List) reaffirmed the single proceeding model in insolvency matters, driven by a desire to avoid the inefficiency and fragmentation associated with multiple separate proceedings.
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June 08, 2026
A decision of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice a few years ago in Simone v. 1312733 Ontario Inc., 2019 ONSC 4420 (appeal dismissed by Divisional Court at 2020 ONSC 6546) set out some important principles to be applied when seeking an order for partition under the Partition Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. P.4. In particular, the court in Simone addressed the circumstances in which an order may be obtained for the partition of property instead of its sale and payment of sale proceeds to the co-owners (for a more detailed analysis of this case, see Partition orders are rare, for good reason).
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June 05, 2026
When a Canadian court or tribunal finds that a party has relied on a case that does not exist, the consequence is far from uniform. In one decision, the lawyer responsible was ordered to pay $17,550 in costs personally. In another, the order was $100. In 60 of the 177 decisions we reviewed, the adjudicator identified the problem but imposed no consequence at all.
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June 04, 2026
Ross v. Luypaert is another interesting case from the Court of Appeal in Ontario. In this case, the two daughters of John Douglas Ross and Regine Ross, Yonna and Lorraine, are the litigation guardians of their incapable parents. The parents owned a property (Property A) jointly with their son, Rene Luypaert. Regine Ross solely owned another property (Property B), which was occupied by their son.
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June 03, 2026
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) has indicated in an updated analysis that “reducing or eliminating development charges could increase the number of financially viable housing projects across Canadian cities, with gains of 9-14 per cent in cities with higher development charges.”
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May 29, 2026
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) has released a new analysis finding that housing starts in Canada could have been nearly 30 per cent higher from 2006 to 2024, and home prices about 10 per cent lower, if regulatory conditions and economic and demographic structural factors had allowed the housing supply to respond more quickly to increases in demand.