What is the difference between owner builders and third parties to a municipality’s duty of care to ensure that all construction is built according to the standards set out in a bylaw?

Ontario, Canada


The following excerpt is from 1606533 Ontario Inc. v. The Corporation of the City of Barrie, 2015 ONSC 490 (CanLII):

In Rothfield v. Manolakos, the court commented on page 12, Moreover, in my view, the distinction sought to be made between owner builders and third parties overlooks the fact that both are ratepayers for whose safety the bylaw was passed. The inspection of plans and the supervision of construction increases the costs of construction for everyone. But I think that most ratepayers, were they to give the matter any thought, would justify the increased expense as an investment in peace of mind: faulty construction, after all, is a danger to life and limb and may result in future expense and liability. This applies equally to owner builders and third parties. Both are justified in saying: “I pay for the provision of an inspection service, and so long as I act in good faith, I should be entitled to rely on the city to exercise reasonable care to ensure that all construction is built according to the standards set out in the bylaws….It must be borne in mind that a municipality, once it has made the policy decision to inspect construction, is not bound to discover every latent defect in a given project, nor every derogation from applicable standards. That would be to hold the municipality to an impossible standard. Rather a municipality is only called upon to show reasonable care in the exercise of its powers of inspection. Accordingly, a municipality, whether the duty of care is owed to an owner builder or a third party, will only incur liability for such defects as it could reasonably be expected to have detected and to have ordered remedied.

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