He doesn't need to, as the loser will pay the winner's court costs up here.
They have nothing to stand on legally, and the fact that their lawyers let this go through is astonishing.
Libel has to be false, and in this case he honestly believes it to be true. The hotel has zero legal standing, and there's a good chance that the judge will... ... oh wait, this is Quebec, so they'd be using Napoleonic code vs Common. I really don't know what would happen, but if it got to SCC, they'd toss it. That's about a million bucks in legal fees start to finish though.