Melting Pot Or Mosaic? The Ongoing Culture Shift Since Hryniak

Over the past year, courts across Canada have responded to the Supreme Court of Canada's clarion call in Hryniak v Mauldin ("Hryniak") for a culture shift to promote access to justice including through summary judgment.[1] The latest word on this front has come from the Alberta Court of Appeal in two recent decisions which seemingly conflict on the threshold to be applied to summary judgment applications.[2] The inherent tension created by Hryniak in Alberta is that the summary judgment rule (Rule 7.3) reflects the 2006 views of the Supreme Court of Canada: that such applications should be used to weed out claims with no chance of success. Post-Hryniak, courts are to consider summary judgment as a legitimate alternative to trial which impliedly sets a lower bar or threshold. An interesting mélange of Ontario and Albertan law has become the order of the day in Alberta – a true cultural melting pot for summary judgment.