“Any right, question, or fact distinctly put in issue and directly determined by a Court of competent jurisdiction as a ground of recovery, or as an answer to a claim set up, cannot be retried in a subsequent suit between the same parties or their privies, even where it is an issue in a different cause of action: McIntosh v. Parent, 1924 Canlii 401, [1924] 4 DLR 420, at 422.”