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Appeals Court Rules in Montrope, Government Matter

The court battle between former Cabinet Secretary Darrel Montrope and the Government over his removal from the position of Cabinet Secretary to Permanent Secretary Department of Labour in January 2017 continues, despite an Appeals Court ruling earlier this month.

Darrel Montrope, Former Cabinet Secretary

According to court documents, Montrope’s removal came out of a decision of the  Governor-General, acting on the advice of the  Public  Service Commission.

“As a consequence of the Governor General’s decision, on 14th June 2017, Mr. Montrope issued a fixed date claim by way of originating motion in the High Court against the Public Service Commission and the Attorney General.  He alleged that his removal from the post of Cabinet  Secretary and his transfer to the post of Permanent Secretary was unconstitutional, in excess of jurisdiction and otherwise unlawful on several grounds,” the court documents stated.

Government responded to Montrope’s motion on  31st July 2017 by filing an application under rules 9.7 and  9.7A of the Civil  Procedure  Rules 2000 declaring that the court had no jurisdiction to try Montrope’s claim and for the originating motion to be struck out, either in its entirety or against the Attorney General. Government also asserted that it was wrongly made a party to the proceedings and that the proceedings were an abuse of the process of the court.

Subsequently,  on  12th September  2017,  a notice of hearing for  21st September 2017 was issued by the High  Court office. According to the Appeals Court the notice of hearing failed to indicate whether it related to the originating motion or to the application to strike or to both.

On 21st September 2017, the matter came up for hearing before the High Court which gave directions on the application to strike and on Montrope’s application. The judge adjourned the hearing to a subsequent date, however on 28th November 2017, Montrope, without seeking the leave of the court, amended his originating motion, which he revised and refiled on18th December 2017.

The matter again came up for hearing on 27th April 2018.    Government, at the hearing, raised a preliminary objection to Montrope’s amendments to his originating motion.

According to the Appeals Court “The crux of the preliminary objection was that Mr.  Montrope required leave to amend his pleadings and no such leave had been obtained.  At paragraph  3  of  the (High Court) judgment,  the  learned  judge characterized the limbs  of  the Attorney General’s preliminary objection as follows: “Distilled to their essence, the Attorney General’s (Government) preliminary objections were  that:  (1)  under  CPR  20.1,  Mr.  Montrope  could  only  amend  his statement of case once without leave at any time before the date on which the matter is fixed for case management; (2) since the statement of case was amended after the date fixed for case management, leave to amend was therefore required to amend; (3) no leave was applied for and, in any event, this was not a proper case for the court to exercise its discretion to grant  leave  to  amend;  (4)  even  if  the  statement  of  case had  not  been previously  amended  and  no  date  for  case  management  had  been  fixed, once an application to strike out a party’s statement of case is before the court,  that  statement  of  case  cannot  be  amended  without  leave  of  the court;  (5)  the  effect  of  the  Attorney General’s application to strike, made pursuant to CPR 9.7, is to stay all proceedings pending the determination of the application and to take precedence over any other application since its  determination  in  favour  of  the  Attorney  General  could  result  in  the matter  being  brought  to  an  end;  that  being  the  case,  any  application  for leave to amend the pleadings would have to come after the determination of the application to strike under Part 9.7.”

Government contended that for the purposes of determining the application to strike, the amendments made without leave should be disregarded and the matter should be determined on the pleadings as originally filed by Montrope. Montrope, in response, contended that no leave was required to amend the originating motion as no date had been fixed for case management of the matter.   He further contended that even if leave were required to amend,  the court ought to be satisfied in the circumstances that the amendments should be permitted. On that basis, he made an oral request at the hearing for leave to amend.

After several submissions by both parties and for reasons outlined by the Appeals Court Chief Justice Dame Janice Pereira who wrote the judgment, to which justices Gertel Thom and Paul Webster concurred, the Government’s appeal was allowed and the High Court’s judge ruling dated 4 May 2018 was set aside.

Pereira further disallowed the amendments made by Montrope to his originating motion and struck out his amended originating motion which was revised and refiled on 18 December 2017. She also remitted the matter to the High Court for the hearing of Government’s CPR 9.7 application to strike and for the High Court to fix a date for the hearing of the application. She made no order as to costs in the matter.

Government was represented by Garth Patterson (QC), Mark Maragh and Rene Williams while Montrope was represented by Anthony Astaphan (SC), Dr Kenny Anthony and Kendrick Kentish. Vern Gill appeared for the Public Service.

Micah George is an established name in the journalism landscape in St. Lucia. He started his journalism tutelage under the critical eye of the Star Newspaper Publisher and well known journalist, Rick Wayne, as a freelancer. A few months later he moved to the Voice Newspaper under the guidance of the paper’s recognized editor, Guy Ellis in 1988.

Since then he has remained with the Voice Newspaper, progressing from a cub reporter covering court cases and the police to a senior journalist with a focus on parliamentary issues, government and politics. Read full bio...

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