The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that an insurance company is off the hook for the costs incurred by a Jesuit order over nine claims of abuse at church-run residential schools.
INDEPTH: Residential schools timeline
The ruling Thursday said Guardian Insurance Co. of Canada is responsible for costs connected with only one claim made against the Jesuit Fathers of Upper Canada in 1994.
That's because the insurance company cancelled the religious order's coverage after hearing about that initial claim, but before nine other similar claims were officially made.
In March 1994, the Jesuit order's lawyer wrote to Guardian to say that a former student had made a claim seeking compensation for alleged physical and sexual abuse, as well as cultural and physical deprivation, suffered at a school the order had run from 1913 to 1958.
The same letter alerted the insurance company that there were nine other potential victims connected with the same school and the Brothers who ran it, and it warned that they too might make claims.
As a result, Guardian refused to renew the order's insurance coverage when it came up for renewal in September of that year, and before the nine other claims had officially been made.
Lawyers for the Jesuits had argued that since the insurance company was given notice of possible claims by the nine people while the policy was in effect, it should pay the costs associated with them.
The trial and appeal divisions of the Ontario Superior Court agreed.
However, the Supreme Court of Canada upheld the insurance company's appeal on Thursday, saying the insurance policy clearly covered only claims legally filed during the term of the policy.
It said the fact that the Jesuits were required by the terms of their policy to report not just claims made, but "occurrences" that could lead to claims, did not mean that the company was responsible for the costs of occurrences that resulted in claims once coverage had ended.
The court also said that there was doubt about whether the nine other people referred to in the March 1994 letter were actually the same people who later made claims.
"Nothing in the record suggests that the person who gave the names of these individuals to the Jesuits’ investigator had the permission of these individuals, either express or implicit, to communicate an intention to hold the Jesuits responsible for injuries suffered at the school," the ruling said. "In fact, it is unclear whether these individuals ever had such an intention."