“Defamation is a strict liability tort. The plaintiff must prove three things to obtain judgment and be awarded damages: “(1) that the impugned words were defamatory, in the sense that they would tend to lower the plaintiff’s reputation in the eyes of a reasonable person; (2) that the words in fact referred to the plaintiff; and (3) that the words were published, meaning that they were communicated to at least one person other than the plaintiff”: Grant v. Torstar Corp., 2009 SCC 61 (CanLII), [2009] 3 S.C.R. 640 at para. 28.”