Our Experience

The following list of work on behalf of labour clients illustrates the depth and breadth of services offered by our Labour Law Practice Group:

Arbitration:

• Established the extent to which employees can claim damages for defamation in a grievance arbitration.
• Established limits on the extent to which tort claims must be pursued through the grievance procedure.
• Established the test for throwing out an employer's case for firing a hospital employee, due to lack of evidence.
• Established the test for reinstatement of a professional who had used physical force against a student.
• Established limits on employers' ability to force employees to retire.

Labour Boards:

• Protected the bargaining rights and collective agreements of unions, and the seniority rights of their members, before the Canada Board during major airline restructuring in the 1990's, 2000 and 2001.
• Protected the bargaining rights of unions before the Public Service Staff Relations Board during the restructuring of federal government departments into Crown Corporations and "alternative delivery service" agencies in the 1990's, 2000 and 2001.
• Protected and enhanced the bargaining rights of unions before the Canada Board during railway restructuring in the 1980's and 1990's.
• Protected the bargaining rights of unions before the Canada Board following the conversion of the postal service to a Crown Corporation in the 1980's.
• Won leading case before the Public Service Staff Relations Board and Canada Board on employer interference with unions' ability to represent their members.

Judicial Review:

• Has regularly represented unions and employees in successful judicial review proceedings before the Federal Court of Canada and the Ontario Divisional Court.
• Presented argument up to the Supreme Court of Canada on the appropriate standard for judicial review of an arbitrator's decision.

Supreme Court of Canada:

• Counsel in a recent (2001) case that protected union members from lawsuits over breaching the union's rules, and that defined the legal obligations between unions and their members.
• Counsel in a case that established the Charter rights of public servants to participate in political activities.
• Counsel in a major case defining the freedom of association in a trade union setting.
• Acted on case defining the standard for judicial review
• Has acted as Ottawa agent for firms across Canada in many Supreme Court of Canada labour cases.

Constitutional/Human Rights Law:

• Acted as lead counsel on Canada's largest pay equity case.
• Acted as counsel in constitutional challenge to limits on pay equity legislation.
• Successfully represented unions in several cases raising the constitutional question of whether certain businesses fall under provincial or federal jurisdiction.
• Defined the rights of employees to be reinstated in cases of substance and gambling addiction.
• Represented employees in a leading case before the Federal Court of Appeal dealing with entitlement to leave for religious holidays.
• Successfully represented an RCMP officer in a leading claim against the federal Crown alleging wrongful dismissal based on sexual orientation.
• Established test to be applied by Canadian Human Rights Review Tribunal to permit the calling of new evidence.
• Acted as lead counsel in one of the first cases defining the application of the Charter in the education sector.

Public Sector:

• Established law of negligent misrepresentation in federal pension plans before the Federal Court of Appeal.
• Acted as counsel before various courts, including the Supreme Court of Canada, establishing employee rights to challenge federal security and reliability clearances.
• Appeared before federal Security Intelligence Review Committee to challenge federal government decisions to deny employment rights to public servants.
• Successfully lobbied for changes to federal legislation extending bargaining rights to employees of Parliament.
• Successfully protected employment rights of many individuals working in the public and quasi-public sectors (federal government, municipal governments, crown corporations and other government agencies) under a wide variety of legal regimes, including unionized staff, order-in-council appointees, "at pleasure" employees, executive and other staff excluded from collective bargaining.
• Acted as lead counsel in several municipal, health sector, and other public sector amalgamations
• Lectured, presented papers and advised clients on the fairness of existing procedures for investigating complaints of personal harassment, leading to major changes in the harassment policies of the federal public service.

Fire Sector:

• Represented fire fighters, police, and retirees in the successful negotiation of the return of pension surpluses in a municipal plan where the employer improperly used surplus for its own purposes.
• Nominee on an important interest arbitration case involving minimum staffing provisions for fire department pumps and aerials. This is one of only a handful of successful arbitration decisions that recognize the connection between staffing and fire fighter safety. This decision is referred to by fire fighters across Canada when dealing with all minimum staffing issues.
• Negotiated and litigated successful settlement of sale of business and representation issues in a case involving the amalgmation of fire and paramedic services into a single EMS.

Police Sector:

• Successfully represented a police officer before the Ontario Civilian Commission on Police Services and the Divisional Court. The police officer was ordered reinstated after being dismissed for a proven theft.
• Successfully represented a police association in the first court case to interpret the new statutory criteria that interest arbitrators must use in fashioning a collective agreement. These statutory criteria are common in labour relations legislation covering several other areas of the public sector.
• Established the right of police officers to disclose information to the Children's Aid Society in potential abuse situations.

Education Sector:

• Defeated an injunction application brought by the Ontario Government to stop the teachers' protest over proposed amendments to the Education Act.
• Acted for teachers unions in resisting Charter challenges to union action.
• Counsel on academic freedom cases, plagiarism and tenure cases in university context.
• Established the test in arbitration for reinstatement of a professional who had used physical force against a student.

Other:

• Established entitlement to workers' compensation benefits for workers suffering from environmental sensitivity.
• Handled successful deferred profit sharing plan litigation in excess of $4 million.
• Won first Canadian wrongful dismissal judgment establishing right to damages for lost life insurance benefits.
• Established employee rights to challenge federal security and reliability clearances in several cases before various courts, including the Supreme Court of Canada.
• On behalf of a coalition of railway unions, successfully opposed regulatory approval to transfer a railway operation from a parent corporation to a subsidiary that might not be able to fund pension and other vested benefits.
• Convinced Court to overturn merger of pension plans where Pension Superintendent had disregarded employees' ownership of surplus.
• Frequently asked by media to comment on major cases and developments in labour law.
• Regularly represent employees in connection with professional discipline tribunals (teaching, health, professions, etc.).