Suit seeks Covid compensation for businesses
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Summary
In this week's episode, we are joined by Jeffrey Rath, the lead counsel on a proposed class action lawsuit that seeks financial redress for Calgary businesses that were forced to close during the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr. Rath and his co-counsel Rebecca Ingram and Christopher Scott are seeking certification of the action as a class action on behalf of every other business or person in Alberta that was economically harmed as a result of the orders of Jason Kenney and Dina Hinshaw that the Alberta Court of Kings bench found illegal under the Public Health Act.
Transcript
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Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Alberta Roundup. I'm your host, Rachel Emanuel.
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For this week's interview, we are joined live with prominent Alberta lawyer, Jeffrey Rath.
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Rath is the lead counsel on a proposed lawsuit that seeks financial redress for Calgary businesses
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that were forced to close during the COVID-19 pandemic. Mr. Rath, thank you so much for joining
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us today. My pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me. So I know that this proposed lawsuit
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stems from the recent Ingram decision in which the Calgary's Court of Kings bench determined that
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some of the public health orders were illegal. And you saw an opportunity there to maybe get
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some redress for some of the businesses that were forced to close. Can you explain how the
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Ingram decision opened up the possibility for this class action lawsuit?
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Yeah. And first of all, this isn't a proposed lawsuit. It actually is a lawsuit on behalf of
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Rebecca Ingram and Christopher Scott. What we're seeking is certification to have the action
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certified as a class action on behalf of every other business or person in Alberta that was
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economically harmed as a result of all of the orders of Jason Kenney and Dina Hinshaw that the
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Alberta Court of Kings bench found to be ultra vires or illegal under the Public Health Act.
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So the process, you know, moving forward is, you know, there is a lawsuit on behalf of Ms.
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Ingram and Mr. Scott, but we've applied to the court for certification of the class action.
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And the hearing of that certification motion is currently scheduled to take place in the first
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week of October of this year. So we're talking about a class action lawsuit. How does that work?
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Do people have to apply to be part of it? Do you automatically just represent all Alberta
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businesses that would fall under the category? The way it works in Alberta is that if people don't
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want to be part of it, they would opt out by contacting our office. That being said, if people
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go to wrathandcompany.com, and again, that's wrathandcompany.com and tap on the business class
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action tab, you'll see that we've, you know, set out all the pleadings, we've set out the
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background of the lawsuit. And what we're asking people to do is to fill out a form with all of
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their information. Because one of the things that we're trying to do is to get a handle on the scope
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of the losses that people have suffered in this province. We suspect that it's in the, you know,
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that it's in the high billions of dollars, you know, in excess of $10 billion. Just looking at
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some of the numbers that we've been seeing and extrapolating from there, some businesses, you
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know, their losses are as, you know, as little as, you know, a few hundred thousand dollars.
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But certainly, you know, median size, small businesses, restaurant chains and others, you know,
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have losses, you know, in the tens of millions of dollars, you know, as a result of all of those
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illegal COVID orders, and, you know, the government of Alberta unlawfully and thoughtlessly destroying
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So when you talk about, you know, you're still sort of in that information gathering portion,
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you're still looking to hear from businesses to see how they were impacted. Do you have any idea
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what sort of monetary amount you would be seeking?
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Well, I mean, it's every business is going to be compensated on the basis of what their
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losses were, you know, as I've indicated, you know, some businesses that can quickly
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quantify their losses, you know, like small, you know, beauty salons, physiotherapy offices,
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dental offices, etc. They can say, okay, I was shut down for six weeks. You know, our, you know,
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our revenue leading up to that was approximately, you know, X number of dollars per week, you know,
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multiplied by, you know, however many weeks, you know, we were that, you know, we were shut down,
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you know, our losses are, you know, several hundred thousand dollars, right? On the other
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hand, you know, as I've indicated, you know, restaurant chains, you know, people that had
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groups of restaurants, the losses could be in the, you know, in the tens of millions of dollars.
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And certainly there are restaurant groups and restaurants in this province that were
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completely bankrupted, you know, as a result, you know, of these thoughtless and illegal orders.
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And, you know, what are the costs of, you know, making those people whole for having their
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families, you know, lives and livelihoods completely destroyed, you know, by somebody,
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you know, somebody who is so incompetent that she didn't even know the scope of her authority
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Sure. Yeah, definitely. One of the civil servants, I think we were just chatting about this
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on the phone the other day, just the amount of money that she herself collected from Canadian
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and Alberta, specifically taxpayers, I think, to the tune of well over half a million dollars.
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And then when we look at some of the impact of businesses, it is certainly concerning.
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I think a lot of people are really excited about this lawsuit.
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Is there a burden of proof on the businesses to prove how much they lost during the period
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Well, obviously there's going to be a requirement for the businesses to prove, you know, their losses.
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But one of the great things about this lawsuit is that liability really isn't an issue,
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you know, thanks to the Ingram decision in the Court of King's Bench.
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The orders were, you know, by declaration of the Court of King's Bench were all illegal.
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You know, we had this process where by, you know, Dina Hinshaw claiming to be everyone's doctor
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and claiming to act as the chief medical officer of health would go into cabinet
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and basically take medical advice from a Divinity School dropout, specifically Jason Kenney,
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with regard to public health orders in the province of Alberta without any thought to the harm
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You know, the other issue that I'd like people to consider with regard to this lawsuit,
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because I know there's people out there that say, oh, you're suing the Alberta government,
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so it's our tax dollars, you know, that are going to have to pay for this.
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You know, I'd like to ask them to consider, you know, whether they think would be appropriate
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if, you know, a government employee driving drunk were to run over one of their parents
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and the taxpayers were on the hook for that, you know, whether or not, you know,
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You know, clearly, you know, everything that happened in this case was as a result of government malfeasance,
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government negligence, you know, I would say gross negligence in terms of the way all of this rolled out.
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You know, so, you know, that needs to be kept in mind, you know,
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And we're obviously hoping that citizens in Alberta, you know,
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will look at the fairness of this situation and say, you know, that, you know,
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on what model, you know, like, let's even assume, which, you know, I think is wrong,
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but let's assume for a minute that locking down the businesses of healthy people,
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preventing them from providing services, you know, to other healthy people,
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And let's assume that it was a bona fide good for the public at large.
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And then what was done was actually for the public good.
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On what theory should the public benefit at the expense of a small class of Alberta citizens?
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I mean, we've got people that, you know, have literally, you know,
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have had a huge fiscal hole put in the middle of their businesses.
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They had to take on partners they never wanted.
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And businesses that were otherwise debt-free are now in hock to the tune of millions of dollars
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to banks that they've had to borrow money from to keep their businesses whole and moving forward.
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And, you know, of course, you know, which, you know, because so much of the equity
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in their businesses were destroyed by these foolish orders promulgated by Jason Denny and Dina Hinshaw.
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So, you know, our question is on what theory should the government escape liability for this?
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So, lead plaintiffs on the case, I know one of them is Chris Scott.
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Can you explain a little bit about who they are?
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Rebecca Ingram, of course, was a gym owner that brought forward the, you know, the Ingram decision.
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And in that case, that case was actually necessary to provide the foundation to this class action
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because there's a section of the Public Health Act that says that the government's immune from suit
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for any actions taken under the Public Health Act.
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So, it was very important to us, you know, from a legal perspective,
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that we won the judgment from the Court of King's Bench saying that all of the orders of Dina Hinshaw
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were ultra-vires the Public Health Act and illegal.
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So, from our analysis and the work that we did in our office,
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it wasn't enough to have the court to say that the orders violated the charter.
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What we really needed was the order saying that the, you know, saying that Dina Hinshaw's public health orders
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were outside of the scope of the Public Health Act because, as a result,
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neither Dina Hinshaw or the government of Alberta now enjoy any protection whatsoever from lawsuit
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because these orders were not issued under the Public Health Act because they were ultra-vires, right?
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And that was the case that Rebecca brought forward when her gym was improperly shut down by Dina Hinshaw.
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So, you know, even if you believed in all the social distancing nonsense that they were promulgating
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and telling people that, you know, if you went to Walmart or Costco, you weren't going to get COVID,
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but if you went to a mom-and-pop on the corner, you're going to get COVID,
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or if you simply followed the arrows on the floor of the co-op, you weren't going to get COVID.
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You know, all of those silly orders that were issued, right?
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You know, so, you know, Rebecca, you know, was running an extremely, you know, well-managed, clean facility.
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There's no documented cases of COVID at her facility whatsoever.
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Yet, she was being shut down and she was forced to sell her business at a loss.
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Chris Scott, you know, was correctly protesting the fact, you know, that these orders were illegal.
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Yet, Chris Scott was taken away in handcuffs and thrown in jail and his business was padlocked
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and he was prevented from running a business and feeding his family, you know, as a result of these illegal orders.
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So, of course, Chris is suing, you know, for the business losses that accrue, you know,
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And we'll also be seeking damages on, you know, on Chris's behalf, you know, for the manner in which he was treated,
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When we talk about the illegal orders, specifically right now, we're looking at financial redress for businesses.
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But have you given any thought to other potential lawsuits that could stem from the Ingram decision?
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Well, I mean, as far as it goes, we're looking, you know, you know, the class of applicants under Ingram
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would include any individual that suffered economic losses as a result of the illegal orders.
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You know, in, you know, in the coming days, we're going to be issuing another press release
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and announcing a major class action lawsuit with regard to vaccine injuries in the province of Alberta.
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Because let's not forget that, you know, let's not forget that the injuries as a result of, you know,
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Dr. Hinshaw's negligence wasn't limited to the illegal orders that she issued.
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Like, remember, Dean Hinshaw, you know, telling people that, you know,
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and after that was discontinued because it was hurting people and injuring people
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oh, well, it doesn't matter that, you know, you've already taken a drug that may have hurt your health.
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You should go out and take whatever other shots available.
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Well, people were horribly injured as a result of Dean Hinshaw's advice
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we'll be representing individuals that were harmed by that negligent medical advice of Dr. Hinshaw's
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and her conspiracy to commit assault in a civil sense, not a criminal sense,
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but a conspiracy to commit civil assault by, you know,
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acting in lockstep with Teresa Tam and other representatives of the government of Canada,
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repeatedly telling people that the vaccines were safe and effective
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while they were simultaneously hiding information from the public about vaccine injuries
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and how dangerous these vaccines actually were, you know, for people.
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I mean, it was certainly well known from the Pfizer data itself
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you're far more likely to be harmed by the vaccines than you were to be harmed by COVID itself.
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There's, you know, I refer to it repeatedly in correspondence with the Prime Minister
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It was Table 14 of the Pfizer EUA application of the United States,
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where Pfizer itself submitted documents to the American government
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that indicated that for children under the age of 18,
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they would notionally save one life per million of children under the age of 18
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if they got the Pfizer COVID vaccine from dying from COVID,
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but they were going to put 34 children into the intensive care unit
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with intense myocarditis if they took the vaccine.
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And of course, all of that information was suppressed by Dean Hinshaw,
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was suppressed by Teresa Tam, was suppressed by the Trudeau government
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because they didn't want people to really know what the risks were
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So in effect, what they were doing was conspiring to prevent people
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from obtaining, you know, full informed consent with regard to the shots.
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So we say from a legal perspective, you know, beyond negligence,
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all of them, including Dean Hinshaw in a civil sense,
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on every citizen in Canada by conspiring to hide information
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with regard to vaccine safety from the Canadian public.
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You know, another good example of this is the fact
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in the vaccine supply contracts to release those contracts
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to the public if they contained information that would be germane
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to the public in making a decision as to whether
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in committee in Ottawa stated publicly that the reason
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and that the vaccines themselves didn't undergo adequate safety,
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long-term safety studies and that the government was, you know,
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forced to, you know, put the vaccines out under those circumstances,
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even though the vaccines weren't warranted for safety
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and the government had to indemnify the vaccine companies
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from any lawsuits arising from unsafe vaccines being put on the market.
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Obviously, all of those facts, if they'd been made available
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to the Canadian public, you know, would have mitigated
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towards a large number of Canadians not having their children vaccinated
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or not agreeing to take part in this huge medical experiment
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that has injured literally tens of thousands of Canadians
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So, you know, in this instance, we're looking at financial redress
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from the Alberta government for affected businesses,
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but when we're talking more about the COVID injury stuff
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I mean, there's, you know, there's something you're taught
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in law school, which is you never sue a man of straw
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The problem is that the first successful lawsuit
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You know, what we're hoping is that Danielle Smith
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clearly the degree to which all of these people
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should be demanding that her attorney general
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of the Progressive Conservative Party of Alberta.
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during the phony public health management crisis
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So when you're talking about criminal sanctions,