Marcil v. Commission scolaire De La Jonquière et al

In July 2013, a proposed class action was filed against a number of Quebec school boards alleging that the certain fees charged violated the guarantee of free educational services provided in Quebec’s Education Act.  In a judgment dated December 6, 2016 (confirmed on appeal in April 2017), the Quebec Superior Court authorized the class action.

In June 2018, a settlement agreement was reached and submitted for approval to the Superior Court.

In a judgment dated July 30, 2018, Justice Carl Lachance of the Superior Court approved the settlement agreement and the proposed terms of the compensation sought by class counsel. Those terms included a request to be reimbursed for the costs of litigation funding.

Justice Lachance held that the funding had been necessary for the class action to proceed. Following a precedent set by Justice Claudine Roy (as she then was) in Marcotte v. Banque de Montréal, 2015 QCCS 1915, Justice Lachance agreed that the financing costs should be reimbursed out of the sums to be collectively recovered, in addition to class counsel fees.