The bitter, prolonged impasse between William ‘Bill’ Clarke and the Canada-based Bank of Nova Scotia over the issue of his retirement package will be heading to arbitration.

The Court of Appeal yesterday morning handed down judgement in favour of Clarke, who hours later described the victory to the Observer as just “one battle in a “long war, an obvious indication that he was digging in for a long fight.

“This is only one battle in a long war,” said Clarke in a non-celebratory tone. He declined to comment further.

The ruling means that a panel of arbitrators will be established to help both parties reach common ground regarding the retirement package. No timeline was given by the court for this to be done.

Scotia was also ordered to pay Clarke’s legal fees, in both the appellate and Supreme courts.

John Vassell, QC, who along with Julianne Mais-Cox and Cindy Lightbourne of the law firm DunnCox appeared for the bank, expressed dissatisfaction with the judgement. Vassell told the Observer that his client was now “studying” the 73-page judgement and will make a decision shortly as to whether or not to appeal to the London-based Privy Council.

Clarke had appealed a March 19 ruling by Justice Horace Marsh of the Supreme Court dismissing his claim for, among other things, a declaration that he and Scotia Bank had a binding agreement for an “equitable retirement package to be settled through arbitration”.

Marsh, at that time, ordered Clarke to vacate the Scotia-owned upper St Andrew home, which he had occupied for the past 13 years as president and chief executive of the institution. Marsh also ruled that Clarke return the two high-end vehicles belonging to Scotia.

The highly publicised appeal, which turned bitter at times, was heard on June 30, July 1, 2 and 6, when judgement was reserved until yesterday.

Based on an earlier agreement with the bank, Clarke will remain in the house and keep the vehicles until a decision is reached on his retirement package at arbitration.

Clarke retired from Scotia Bank Jamaica on November 1 last year after 40 years, but later took legal action against the institution after negotiations about a possible retirement package broke down.

Clarke said that under the terms of the bank’s employment, he was not due to retire until December 15, 2015 when he turned 65 years old. Clarke said also that on July 16 last year the board of directors of the bank requested that he go on early retirement on the basis that he would be provided with a fair and equitable retirement package.

The bank did offer Clarke Cdn$3 million as a settlement package but the offer was rejected.

Yesterday, the court noted in its judgement that there was no doubt that both parties had an agreement for the matter to go to arbitration. The agreement, the court found, was reached when the board of Scotia Jamaica in October 2008 passed a resolution accepting Clarke’s proposal for the matter to go to arbitration, should there be a breakdown in negotiations over the retirement package.

“… An agreement came into being at the time the resolution was passed,” said the ruling.

“Indeed, the appellant’s attorney’s letter of October 29th in which reference was made to the confirmation of the acceptance and the appellant’s letter of November 3, 2008 are consistent with this conclusion,” the judgement continued.

The court also noted that five other board members – including Senator Mark Golding, Dr Herbert Thompson and Charlie Johnson – had also, by way of letter, agreed that there was an agreement for the matter to go to arbitration.

Dr Lloyd Barnett, Keith Bishop, and Kerry-Ann Ebanks, instructed by Bishop and Fullerton, appeared for Clarke.