Enforcement/Homologation Archives

October 3, 2025October 3, 2025

Ontario – Party bound by rule change despite not agreeing to it – #920

In InFrontier AF LP v. Rahmani, 2025 ONSC 3968 (CanLII) (“InFrontier”), the Court heard an application to recognize and enforce an award and considered the effect of amendments to the arbitral rules chosen by the parties in their arbitration agreement. The parties had agreed to settle disputes by arbitration seated in Dubai using a specific set of arbitration rules (the “OldRules”) administered by a specific arbitral institution. Before the arbitration commenced, a change in Dubai law led to those rules being replaced by a new set of rules (the “New Rules”) to be administered by a different institution. As described below, there was a degree of connection between the Old Rules and the New Rules and between the two institutions. The arbitration proceeded under the New Rules. Mr. Rahmani, the Respondent in the arbitration, unsuccessfully challenged the arbitrator’s jurisdiction to proceed under the New Rules. He was also unsuccessful in the arbitration. InFrontier applied for recognition and enforcement of the award in Ontario. Mr. Rahmani opposed the application, arguing: (1) the composition of the tribunal and the arbitration procedure were not in accordance with the arbitration agreement because the arbitration proceeded, without his agreement, under the New Rules, (2) recognizing and enforcing the award would be contrary to public policy in Ontario because it was obtained as a result of a retroactive amendment to the arbitration agreement without the parties’ consent, and (3) he was unable to present his case during the arbitration. The Court rejected all his arguments.

This case summary deals only with Issue 1.

July 3, 2025July 4, 2025

Alberta – Court enforces med/arb consent award over bias objection – #910

In Heine v Worsfold, 2025 ABKB 307, the court enforced a consent award rendered in a family dispute over objections that the arbitrator – who had also mediated the parties’ settlement – had demonstrated bias against the Applicant in the mediation. While the case raised a plethora of other issues, at the core were allegations about the mediator/arbitrator’s conduct in the mediation process.

June 9, 2025June 9, 2025

International – Waiver of State Immunity and State Parties to the NY Convention – #908

On 17 April 2025, England’s High Court released its judgment in CC/Devas (Mauritius) Ltd. et ors v The Republic of India. The judgment relates to sovereign immunity pursuant to the UK’s State Immunity Act 1978 (“SIA UK”) and the enforcement of arbitral awards made pursuant to a bilateral investment treaty (“BIT”). The specific question for the English High Court was whether or not India had submitted to the adjudicative jurisdiction of the English courts by its ratification of the United Nations Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (New York, 1959) (“NY Convention”). In finding that India had not waived its sovereign immunity through “prior written agreement” only by ratifying the NY Convention, the English High Court has joined company with other American jurisprudence and has parted company with Canadian, Singaporean, and Dutch jurisprudence arising from the same factual background and underlying disputes.

January 28, 2025January 31, 2025

International – Agreement to Arbitration and Enforcement Jurisdiction a Package – #891

In Republic of India c. CCDM Holdings, 2024 QCCA 1620 the Court was asked to determine three appeals relating to the enforcement of arbitral awards in the context of: (1) both the commerciality exception and waiver in the State Immunity Act; (“SIA”) (2) seizure before judgment in escrow of sums held by the Montreal-headquartered International Air Transport Association (“IATA”) for the benefit of two Indian state entities before the question of their immunity had been decided on the merits; and (3) the temporal scope of provincial legislation passed in response to said seizures at the IATA. The Court concluded that: (1) India had waived immunity under the SIA by becoming a party to the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards 1958 (the “New York Convention”) and by agreeing to arbitration under the 1998 India-Mauritius bilateral investment treaty (“India-Mauritius BIT”); (2) the first-instance court had not erred in authorizing ex parte seizure before judgment in advance of the question of immunity being decided on the merits; and (3) the provincial legislation was effective retroactively to the effective date given therein but no further back in time – the seizure of sums held by the IATA prior to this date remained untouched by the legislation.

January 10, 2025January 10, 2025

Philippe’s 2024 Hot Topic – Québec courts rejected creative challenges to arbitral awards – #887

In 2024, parties raised various novel and creative grounds (and also some more traditional grounds) to seek annulment or resist the homologation of arbitral awards in Québec.

November 18, 2024November 22, 2024

Ontario – Application to enforce award against non-party to arbitration stayed – #875

In Sociedad Concesionaria Metropolitana De Salud S.A. v Webuild S.P.A, 2024 ONSC 4491 the Court considered whether to grant an application to enforce an arbitral award against a non-party to the arbitration. The non-party had purchased assets of the unsuccessful party to the arbitration as part of a restructuring proceeding in Italy. The successful party to the arbitration and the non-party disagreed on whether the asset purchase included the transfer of the unsuccessful party’s obligations under the award to the non-party. The Court stayed the enforcement application pending a determination of that threshold issue by the Italian courts.

October 25, 2024October 18, 2024

Québec – Award that violates municipal by-law does not offend public policy – #871

In Bélanger c Beauchamp, 2024 QCCS 3118, the Court homologated several awards rendered in the context of a dispute between two co-owners of an undivided property concerning the location and size of their parking spaces. The Defendant contested the homologation of one of the awards based on public policy grounds, alleging that the award violated a municipal by-law. The Court ruled that any violation of the municipal by-law that would result from the award did not amount to a public policy violation that justified refusing homologation, because it would not be a violation that offends the fundamental values underlying Québec public policy. The Court also decided that an award rejecting one of the parties’ applications for recusal of the arbitrator did not constitute an award within the meaning of the Québec Code of Civil Procedure (“CCP”), and so could not be homologated. This latter issue is not addressed in this case note.

August 12, 2024August 9, 2024

Ontario – Partial Summary Judgment Test Applied on Recognition of Foreign Award Motion – #853

In Shanghai Investment Co. Ltd. V. Lu et al., 2024 ONSC 2762 the Chambers Judge concluded that to grant a motion asking that a foreign award be “domesticated” (that is, recognized and made enforceable as a judgment of the Ontario Court), the motion must also meet the additional requirements for partial summary judgment. In this case, the recognition of the foreign award was pleaded as a threshold issue and formed part of a larger enforcement action. As a result, if the motion for recognition were granted, it would bifurcate the action. Although the Ontario Court of Appeal in cases like Butera v. Chown, Cairns LLP, 2017 ONCA 783 (“Butera”) has held that partial summary judgment should rarely be granted as it usually not efficient nor cost effective, the Chambers Judge determined that it was appropriate in this case. Among other factors she noted was that the recognition portion of the action was distinct from the rest and there was no risk of inconsistent findings.

July 2, 2024July 2, 2024

Alberta – Arbitrator not functus for issuing consent award after party denied settlement – #844

In Caroll v Caroll, 2024 ABKB 227, the Court found that the Arbitrator was not functus officio for issuing a Consent Award after a settlement was reached in a med-arb process. One party denied the settlement but argued that, in any event, the Arbitrator’s jurisdiction was over after the settlement agreement and it was improper to “crystallize” the agreement into the Award. The Court dismissed this argument and found that there was a settlement. And the process was not unfair. The Arbitrator did not “conflate” the mediation and arbitration phases of the proceeding by terminating the proceeding after the settlement agreement rather than proceeding to arbitration once one party denied the settlement.

June 5, 2024May 30, 2024

Ontario – International award enforced despite respondent’s non-participation – #839

Medivolve Inc. v. JSC Chukotka Mining and Geological Company, 2024 ONSC 2200, the Court refused Medivolve’s application to set aside an international arbitration award issued by a Moscow-seated tribunal, instead granting Chukotka’s application to recognize and enforce the award. Medivolve failed to appear at the arbitration and claimed that it had not been given proper notice or an opportunity to be heard. The Court found that Medivolve had proper notice of the arbitration within the meaning of Art. 36(1)(a)(ii) of the UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration (the “Model Law”). It had received actual notice, by email, of the pendency and status of the arbitration well before the award was rendered even though it changed offices (without notifying the opposing party).