Welbridge Holdings v Greater Winnipeg

Welbridge Holdings v Greater Winnipeg
Citation	Welbridge Holdings v Greater Winnipeg, [1971] SCR 957
Appellant	Welbridge Holdings Ltd.
Respondent	The Metropolitan Corporation of Greater Winnipeg
Year	1971
Court	Supreme Court of Canada
Judges	Martland, Judson, Ritchie, Spence, and Laskin JJ
Country	Canada
Area of law	Duty of care
Issue	Does the fact that a company did not exist when a by-law was passed mean that it cannot have been owed a duty of care?

Facts

The City of Winnipeg passed a by-law permitting companies to erect high rise apartments in a certain area. Welbridge was incorporated after this by-law was passed, and made plans to build apartments in the area and acquired some land in this area approximately 16 months later. The by-law was struck down by the courts as not being valid. Welbridge sued stating the city was negligent in passing an invalid by-law.

Issue

1. Does the fact that a company did not exist when a by-law was passed mean that it cannot have been owed a duty of care?

Decision

Appeal dismissed.

Reasons

A municipality is different in kind from the same munici­pality at the legislative or quasi-judicial level where it is exercising discretionary statutory authority. In exercising such authority, a municipality may act beyond its powers in the ultimate view of a Court, albeit it acted on the advice of counsel. It would be incredible to say in such cir­cumstances that it owed a duty of care giving rise to liability in damages for its breach. Laskin noted, however, that if the City had owed a duty of care to a class of persons, they would not be excluded simply for not having existed when the by-law was passed.

Ratio

If a duty of care is owed to a class of people, then a specific individual will not be excluded from that class simply because they did not exist at the time of the negligent act.