The insurers of the Cascades, Abitibi-Price and Alcan companies, the names of the time, will ultimately not be reimbursed by the government for the damage suffered on their facilities during the Saguenay flood 25 years ago, TVA Nouvelles learned on Wednesday .
• Read also: 25 years after the Saguenay flood: municipalities have their share of responsibility in flood management
The legal actions brought more than 20 years ago have just been rejected by the Superior Court of Quebec due to unreasonable delays. The court even called the case a real legal skid.
The torrential rains of July 1996 had hurt the multinationals, in particular the pumping and water treatment stations of the former Cascades factory in Jonquière, which were destroyed.
The Abitibi-Price hydroelectric installations also suffered major damage, as did the Alcan factories and its railroad network.
These companies were compensated by their respective insurers, but for the latter, it is the Quebec government that is responsible for the disaster.
Lawsuits were filed against the Attorney General and the Société immobilière du Québec following the deluge, claims amounting to nearly $100 million for these three cases.
The insurers, however, had not filed any application for registration for trial and judgment, or any other proceedings for several years, when the government in turn went to court in 2019 and asked it to dismiss the appeals because of the unreasonable delays. .
“The judge remarks that there were no interrogations and that no expertise was produced”, noted the civil law lawyer, Me Régis Gaudreault, to whom TVA Nouvelles asked to comment on the decision as a specialist.
The government’s request is fully justified, he said.
“Over the years, we know very well that memory is a faculty that forgets,” he said. It can then be argued that the defendants will not have the right to full answer and defence. There may be documents that have been lost or even witnesses who are no longer there.”
The judge wrote in his decision that “such delays are abnormal, that they constitute a real judicial slippage, even an attack on the administration of justice”. He added that “more than 20 years have passed without the simple production of a tusk being demanded. […] This delay is manifestly unreasonable and abusive,” concluded the court.
“Normally, a period of 12 to 18 months for a procedure is quite the maximum that can be stretched since the entry into force of the new code of civil procedure in 2016”, specified Me Gaudreault.
Insurers have 30 days to appeal the decision.
“The judge protected himself well. He has circumscribed the problem well, so I doubt that it can go further, ”said Régis Gaudreault.