Whack-A-Mole and Cherry Trees: What Do Recent Stays Mean for Abuse of Process Arguments in Class Proceedings?

Over the last two decades, defendants to Canadian class actions have regularly faced the prospect of defending identical or very similar proceedings filed by the same class counsel in two or more provinces.

Despite the general rule that plaintiffs may not litigate the same claim in two separate actions, defendants were largely unsuccessful in obtaining stays of duplicative class proceedings.

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