Justifying the Line in the Sand: Remoteness in Canadian Tort Law

The Supreme Court of Canada imported preexisting remoteness rules into Canadian tort law without justifying why they apply in the distinctively Canadian negligence framework endorsed in Cooper v. Hobart. This paper attempts to justify remoteness in this framework. Justifying remoteness as a standalone policy tool is unsatisfactory because it cannot explain why remoteness requires a reasonable foreseeability standard nor that remoteness operates as a fair limit on liability. Justifying remoteness in relation to the duty of care is satisfying. Remoteness supports the duty of care by allowing decision-makers to identify sufficiently general categories of duty of care that apply beyond the individual facts of the case. They can then confirm or deny liability by particularizing the risk at the remoteness stage. This ensures the framework applies as intended, adheres to decision-makers’ sense of justice, and achieves fair and socially useful results.