Supreme Court recognizes intimate partner violence as a legal basis for civil damages

The Supreme Court of Canada is seen in Ottawa on Monday, June 3, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick

OTTAWA — The Supreme Court of Canada has recognized intimate partner violence as a distinct legal basis for pursuing civil damages.

The top court’s ruling Friday came in the case of a woman who was subjected to physical and emotional abuse by her husband during a 16-year marriage.

“Intimate partner violence is a social ill and a deep affront to one’s dignity,” Justice Nicholas Kasirer wrote on behalf of a majority of the court.

The court said the torts of assault, battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress — existing legal avenues for seeking financial damages — fail to remedy the specific harms to dignity, autonomy and equality caused by intimate partner violence.

The judgment said this form of violence is not limited to threats to physical or psychological integrity but also includes abusive behaviour by one partner meant to coerce and control the other, effectively depriving them of their autonomy.

It said this behaviour could involve egregious acts of physical and psychological violence, as well as tactics of isolation, manipulation, humiliation, surveillance, economic abuse, sexual coercion and intimidation.

The new tort of intimate partner violence is not simply an aggregate of wrongful conduct already remedied by various existing torts, Kasirer wrote.

“While some of the conduct captured by the new tort may overlap with existing torts, coercive intimate partner violence generally includes and extends beyond discrete acts of physical and psychological abuse,” he said.

“None of the existing torts consider whether the alleged wrongful conduct coerces or controls the victim, nor are they designed to compensate the victim for the distinct injury to their intangible interests in dignity, autonomy, and equality within an intimate relationship.”

Kasirer provided reasons on behalf of five judges. A sixth member of the court, Justice Andromache Karakatsanis, also said a new tort of intimate partner violence should be recognized, but provided her own reasons. Three dissenting judges said there was no need to create a new tort.

Kasirer wrote that violence between intimate partners must be distinguished from “mere grievances or the hurtful and sometimes vengeful behaviour that can be part of high-conflict disputes.”

“Dishonesty, infidelity, emotional neglect, and disagreements may cause intimacy to break down but do not necessarily reflect controlling or coercive conduct,” he wrote.

Kasirer also said efforts to confront intimate partner violence must begin by recognizing that women are overwhelmingly those most often harmed by their partners.

The Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund, an intervener in the case, applauded the top court’s decision, saying it acknowledges the unique harms and financial burdens faced by survivors.

“The new tort of intimate partner violence says that yes, these harms are real, and yes, they merit compensation,” Kat Owens, the organization’s legal director, said in a media statement.

The newly recognized legal basis should make it easier for people, particularly those without a lawyer, to pursue claims in court, Owens said in an interview.

The ruling is important in a social climate where “we’re seeing a lot of pushback against women’s rights,” Owens said. “We’re seeing a lot of questioning about, well, did people really experience violence?”

The case before the court began when Amrit Pal Singh Ahluwalia initiated divorce proceedings in Ontario court. His wife, Kuldeep Kaur Ahluwalia, proved that she had suffered abuse by her husband over the course of the marriage.

The trial judge found the sustained abusive conduct included physical assaults, humiliation, intimidation and behaviour intended to cause emotional distress.

The judge concluded the husband coerced and controlled his wife in order to break her will and condition her to obey him from the beginning of their marriage, the top court noted in its ruling.

“Behind the shield of intimacy, he imposed a conception of marriage on Ms. Ahluwalia where the husband and wife were one, and that one was Mr. Ahluwalia,” said the ruling.

The Ontario court ordered remedies related to the marriage breakdown, including child and spousal support, and the wife, who represented herself at trial, was awarded $150,000 in damages under what the judge called a new tort of family violence.

The Ontario Court of Appeal allowed the husband’s appeal in part, reducing the damage award and declining to recognize the new tort on the basis that a novel one should be introduced only when existing remedies are inadequate.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 15, 2026.

Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press