The Canadian Press
The federal government says a law firm that represented thousands of residential school survivors should have to pay back legal fees because it inflated its billings.
Arguments were made Tuesday in the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, where lawyers for the Canada’s attorney general accused the Merchant Law Group of fraud, deceit and fraudulent misrepresentation.
The government said it wouldn’t have entered into an agreement a decade ago to pay Merchant Law Group $25 million if it had known there were concerns about how much time the company spent working on residential school claims.
Merchant’s lawyer said the government knew there were concerns about billing and went into negotiations with its eyes wide open. Also, Merchant’s lawyer said previous courts, including the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal, approved the payment.
