Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• The motion required the court to determine whether the Plaintiff could amend his Statement of Claim to add six new individual defendants under Rules 26.01 and 5.04(2) of the Rules of Civil Procedure.
   
• Personal liability of individual employees turned on whether their conduct fell outside the scope of their corporate roles, per the test in Kraik v. Ungar.
   
• Limitation periods under the Limitations Act, 2002 barred most of the factual allegations underlying the proposed amendments.
   
• Sufficiency of pleadings was assessed against the requirement in Rule 25.06(8) that amendments contain a concise statement of material facts.
   
• Judicial discretion under Rule 5.04(2) provided an independent basis to refuse the addition of parties on grounds of delay and prejudice.
   
• Ultimately, the court dismissed the motion after finding no reasonable cause of action had been disclosed against any of the six proposed individual defendants.

Facts of the case

Jian Guo Huang was employed by T&T Supermarket Inc. from on or about February 4, 2022, until September 27, 2023, when his employment was terminated for cause. Huang, self-represented throughout, filed an original Statement of Claim on December 20, 2024, and an Amended Claim on January 8, 2025. T&T filed a Statement of Defence on March 26, 2025, and Huang filed a Reply on March 28, 2025. On July 21, 2025, Huang advised T&T's counsel that he intended to move to further amend his claim to add eight individual defendants, though he did not provide a draft at that time. In his August 29, 2025 Motion Record, he produced a Proposed Further Amended Claim seeking to add those defendants and sought orders for substituted service on six of them and confirmation that in-person or HR-facilitated service sufficed for the remaining two. On September 22, 2025, he served a Second Proposed Further Amended Claim adding two further individuals, Minnie Zhao and Valerie He, followed on September 23, 2025 by a new Notice of Motion. On October 15 and 16, 2025, he personally served Minnie Zhao, Renee Shao, Charles Zhang, and Weige Wu with a Notice of Motion. On October 17, 2025, he served the Defendant with a Third Proposed Further Amended Claim that removed four of the previously named individuals — Tony Liu, GuoFu Chen [also referred to elsewhere in the source as "Guo Fu Chan"], Chung Chan, and Valerie He — leaving six proposed additions: Minnie Zhao, Renee Shao, Tina Lee, Amanda Wen, Charles Zhang, and Weige Wu. Huang sought leave under Rules 26.01 and 5.04(2) to add these individuals, an order permitting substituted service through T&T's corporate email or human resources department, and an order deeming the amended claim issued nunc pro tunc as of September 25, 2025. T&T opposed the motion and, in the alternative, asked the court to dismiss it under Rule 5.04(2).

Policy and legislative provisions at issue

The motion engaged Rule 26.01 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, which favours granting leave to amend pleadings but does not confer an absolute right to do so, and requires that any amendment not cause irremediable prejudice, disclose a cause of action, and otherwise comply with the rules of pleading. Rule 25.06(8) requires amended pleadings to contain a concise statement of material facts and sufficient particulars, particularly for allegations such as fraud and misrepresentation. Rule 5.04(2), a discretionary provision distinct from the mandatory Rule 26.01, allows the court to refuse to add a party where doing so would cause undue delay, complicate the hearing, or prejudice another party. The Limitations Act, 2002 was also central: section 5 presumes a claimant discovers a claim on the date the underlying act or omission occurs, and section 21(1) bars adding a party after the applicable limitation period has expired.

Reasoning and analysis

Justice Gibson concluded the motion should fail because the proposed amendments disclosed no reasonable cause of action against the six individual defendants, lacked sufficient particulars, and were, for the most part, time-barred. Applying the test from Kraik v. Ungar, the court noted that an employee can only be personally liable where their conduct is itself tortious or exhibits a separate identity from that of the employer, taking them outside their role as a directing mind of the corporation. Reviewing the allegations against each proposed defendant in turn, Gibson J. found that Huang's pleadings against Tina Lee, Amanda Wen, Charles Zhang, Weige Wu, Renee Shao, and Minnie Zhao consisted largely of bald, conclusory assertions of fraud, bad faith, discrimination, or misrepresentation without the material facts needed to support an independent cause of action against each individual. Many of the specific incidents pleaded — including alterations to a Return to Work Plan, statements made in WSIB filings, and workplace interactions dating largely from 2022 and early 2023 — fell outside the Limitations Act's two-year period and had not been shown to fall within any recognized exception. As an independent basis for dismissal, the court held that even if the Rule 26.01 test had been met, it would exercise its discretion under Rule 5.04(2) to refuse the amendments, observing that adding six additional individual defendants, including a senior corporate officer whose only alleged connection was that her assistant responded to an email from Huang, would unduly complicate and delay the proceeding given the resulting entitlement to examine each newly added party for discovery.

Ruling and overall outcome

The court dismissed Huang's motion for leave to amend his Statement of Claim in accordance with the Third Proposed Further Amended Claim, and correspondingly declined to grant the related relief sought, including the proposed substituted service and nunc pro tunc issuance of the amended claim. T&T Supermarket Inc. was therefore the successful party on the motion. On costs, the decision did not fix an amount; the parties were instead directed to attempt to agree on costs, with a schedule set for written submissions if they could not, and a term that costs would be deemed settled between the parties if no submissions were filed within that timeframe. No monetary amount was awarded or specified in this decision.