Anna Wong, ‘Duty of Honest Performance: A Tort Dressed in Contract Clothing’

ABSTRACT
In CM Callow Inc v Zollinger, the latest installment from the Supreme Court of Canada on the duty of honest performance, the Court insisted that it is a contractual duty rather than a tortious one. This article contends that the duty to act honestly, a welcome addition as it is to the realm of private-law obligations, represents an infusion of tort logic into contract law. To preserve the coherence of orthodox contract law as a distinct field of liability, the duty should be reclassified under tort. Its breach should be recognized as a tortious wrong, attracting compensation for reliance, not expectation, losses.

Wong, Anna SP, Duty of Honest Performance: A Tort Dressed in Contract Clothing (May 2, 2022).

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