Canada Cooperatives Act (S.C. 1998, c. 1)

Marginal note:Degree of responsibility

• 337.3 (1) Subject to this section and sections 337.4 to 337.6, every defendant or third party who has been found responsible for a financial loss is liable to the plaintiff only for the portion of the damages that corresponds to their degree of responsibility for the loss.

• Marginal note:Uncollectable amounts

  (2) If any part of the damages awarded against a responsible defendant or third party is uncollectable, the court may, on the application of the plaintiff, reallocate that amount to the other responsible defendants or third parties, if the application is made within one year after the date that the judgment was made enforceable.

• Marginal note:Reallocation

  (3) The amount that may be reallocated to each of the other responsible defendants or third parties under subsection (2) is calculated by multiplying the uncollectable amount by the percentage that corresponds to the degree of responsibility of that defendant or third party for the total financial loss.

• Marginal note:Maximum amount

  (4) The maximum amount determined under subsection (3), in respect of any responsible defendant or third party, may not be more than fifty per cent of the amount originally awarded against that responsible defendant or third party.

Marginal note:Exception — fraud

• 337.4 (1) The plaintiff may recover the whole amount of the damages awarded by the court from any defendant or third party who has been held responsible for a financial loss if it was established that the defendant or third party acted fraudulently or dishonestly.

• Marginal note:Contribution

  (2) The defendant or third party referred to in subsection (1) is entitled to claim contribution from any other defendant or third party who is held responsible for the loss.

Marginal note:Individual or personal body corporate

• 337.5 (1) Defendants and third parties referred to in subsection 337.2(1) are jointly and severally, or solidarily, liable for the damages awarded to a plaintiff who is an individual or a personal body corporate and who

  • (a) had a financial interest in a cooperative on the day that an error, omission or misstatement in financial information concerning the cooperative occurred, or acquired a financial interest in the period between the day that the error, omission or misstatement occurred and the day, as determined by the court, that it was generally disclosed; and

  • (b) has established that the value of the plaintiff’s total financial interest in the cooperative was not more than the prescribed amount at the close of business on the day that the error, omission or misstatement occurred or at the close of business on any day that the plaintiff acquired a financial interest in the period referred to in paragraph (a).

• Marginal note:Exception

  (1.1) Subsection (1) does not apply when the plaintiff brings the action as a member of a partnership or other association or as a trustee in bankruptcy, liquidator, receiver or sequestrator of a body corporate.

• Marginal note:Interpretation

  (2) For the purposes of this section,

  • (a) a personal body corporate is a body corporate that is not actively engaged in any financial, commercial or industrial business and that is controlled by an individual, or by a group of individuals who are connected by marriage, common-law partnership or any legal parent-child relationship or are connected indirectly by a combination of those relationships, whether or not the individuals through whom they are connected are members of the group; and

  • (b) a common-law partnership is a relationship between two persons who are cohabiting with each other in a conjugal relationship and have done so for a period of at least one year.