Appeal Court underlines employers do not have a free pass to ask questions to potential employees

A prospective police officer who alleged that the Quebec provincial police force withdrew its pre-employment offer because he has Tourette Syndrome was rebuffed by the Quebec Court of Appeal after it found instead that he was not forthright and did not act in good faith during the hiring process.

In a decision in line with prior jurisprudence, the Quebec Appeal Court sheds new guidance that advises employers to exercise caution when drafting questionnaires, particularly medical queries, even in cases when pre-employment offers have been made, according to employment and legal experts. The unanimous per curium ruling acknowledges that it is a difficult balance to achieve between asking overly broad questions that may be deemed to be discriminatory under the Quebec Charter of human rights and freedoms and drafting “too specific” questions that may deprive employers of relevant and necessary information.

“It provides some guidelines to employers,” remarked Finn Makela, a law professor at the Université de Sherbrooke where he teaches labour and employment law. “One, it’s not an open bar. Employers can’t just ask super vague questions. And second, the decision also confirms the jurisprudence that the employer needs to justify in their specific circumstances why questions are related to job functions. So that gives some guidance. But, as the Cour of Appeal says, it’s not always easy.”

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Obtaining punitive damages from police remains “high bar”

The challenge for plaintiffs to obtain punitive damages against police was plainly illustrated yet again according to legal experts after four victims of the 2012 election shooting in a Montreal downtown venue that targeted then-premier-elect Pauline Marois of the Parti Québécois won a partial victory following a court decision that awarded them nearly $300,000 in pecuniary and non-pecuniary damages.

Quebec Superior Court Justice Philippe Bélanger found that the provincial and Montreal police forces committed a fault of omission and failed to ensure to ensure the safety of the public after they carried out a flawed security plan that allowed a gunman to kill lighting technician Denis Blanchette and seriously injure a second technician who was struck by the same bullet. Justice Bélanger ordered damages to be paid to Blanchette’s colleagues who survived the shooting after they successfully argued that they suffered from post-traumatic stress and other psychological damage following the shooting.

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New labour relations legal landscape on the horizon following Appeal Court decision

A new legal landscape governing labour relations may be in the horizon in Quebec following a Court of Appeal decision that found that the provincial Labour Code breached the Canadian and Quebec Charters by prohibiting first-level managers from unionizing.

“It’s a very important decision because it kind of creates a crack in the legislative scheme that we have in Quebec with regards to labour relations,” said Shwan Shaker, a labour and employer senior associate with Borden Ladner Gervais LLP. “It’s kind of opening a breach to allow low level managers to unionize. But it’s important to keep in mind that this is really case-by-case.”

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Mandatory retirement clauses breach Quebec Charter, rules court

Professional services firms that have mandatory retirement policies and provisions that require partners to divest their ownership shares solely on the basis of age are discriminatory and in breach of the Quebec Charter of human rights and freedoms held Quebec Superior Court in a ruling that has the legal community buzzing over its implications.

In a case that pitted a Montreal municipal and labour and employment law firm against its founder, the decision by Quebec Superior Court Justice Stéphane Lacoste is expected to have wider repercussions than the thorny issue of mandatory retirement, according to legal observers. Following the decision in DHC Avocats inc. c. Dufresne, 2022 QCCS 58, typical arrangements made by professional services firms in succession planning such as “unpartnering” or changing the status of their senior partners while still allowing them to work in the firm may be called into question, added legal experts. Continue reading “Mandatory retirement clauses breach Quebec Charter, rules court”

Aluminum maker discriminated against students rules Quebec appeal court

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Students who were paid less than casual and regular workers by an aluminum smelter even though they performed equivalent work were discriminated against on the basis of social condition, held the Quebec Court of Appeal.

In a decision expected to have significant repercussions in the province’s labour landscape, the Quebec Court of Appeal clarified the burden of proof when challenging the discriminatory nature of a measure, held that students fall within the notion of “social condition” under the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms, and confirmed that discriminatory claims under the Quebec Charter do not require additional evidence of discrimination stemming from prejudice, stereotypes or social context, according to experts. Social condition refers to the rank and place an individual occupies in society.

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Damages award in Quebec comic’s discrimination case called ‘dangerous’

A controversial Quebec Court of Appeal ruling that ordered a comedian to pay $35,000 in damages to another entertainer for infringing his right to the safeguard of his dignity without discrimination after mocking his disability may lead to a chilling effect because the decision provides scant guidance over when the line is crossed, human rights law and media law experts said.

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Quebec appeal court rules woman wearing hijab was entitled to be heard in court

A day after Quebec premier-elect François Legault suggested he would be ready to invoke the Constitution’s notwithstanding clause to override the Charter of Rights and Freedoms to ban religious symbols for civil servants, the Quebec Court of Appeal court ruled that a provincial court judge erred when she denied a hearing to a woman wearing a hijab.

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French language still needs protection rules Quebec appeal court

A bid to overturn Quebec’s sign law by a group of anglophone merchants suffered yet another setback after the Quebec Court of Appeal upheld two lower court rulings that held that the French language is still vulnerable in Quebec and continues to need protection even though it has made “modest progress” in recent decades.

In a ruling hailed as significant by constitutional law experts, the appeal court underlined that jurisprudence held that the alleged violations of freedom of expression and the right to equality were justified under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Quebec Charter of human rights and freedoms.

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Damages awarded to the mother of a child who was the victim of discrimination

The mother of a child who was the victim of discrimination based on a handicap was awarded $7,500 in moral damages by the Quebec Court of Appeal in a ruling that reaffirms and advances the rights of parents, according to educational and human rights lawyers.

In a closely-watched ruling by the province’s educational sector, the Montreal School Commission was also ordered to pay an equal amount in moral damages to the child, who is afflicted with Down syndrome, after the appeal court found that it discriminated against him when it failed to implement necessary accommodations to teach him in the first two years of high school.

However the appeal court also found that the school commission did not act in a discriminatory manner when it decided that it would be in the best interests of the child, given his special needs, if he pursued his studies in a specialized school rather than a regular school. “It appeared that, from an educational standpoint, the difference between X and his classmates was too great and prevented (him) from truly integrating or socializing,” remarked the appeal court in a 22-page decision in Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse c. Commission scolaire de Montréal 2017 QCCA 286.

“This is an important decision because a trend has emerged where the courts refused to grant damages to parents in similar cases,” said Lysiane Clément-Major, a Montreal lawyer with the Quebec Human Rights Commission. “There have been several decisions that refused to grant damages to parents because the courts held that it was not the parents who were the victim of discrimination. This ruling is very important for the Commission because it establishes the rights of parents.”

In a decision that partly overturned a decision by the Quebec Human Rights Tribunal, the appeal court found that the parents of children who are victims of discrimination based on a handicap can claim compensation for themselves. Heeding guidance by the Supreme Court of Canada in Infineon Technologies AG v. Option consommateurs, 2013 SCC 59, the appeal court noted that while Quebec civil law does not permit compensation for indirect damage, it does allow for damages to be awarded to indirect victims. As the SCC points out, an indirect victim is someone who suffers an autonomous injury after the commission of a fault, where the damage suffered was the logical, direct and immediate result of the fault. In this case, the harm suffered by the mother arose from the from the discriminatory treatment inflicted upon her son, found the appeal court. Her despondency, stress, worry and feeling of powerlessness surfaced when her son could not assert his rights personally, and therefore it fell upon her to represent and defend the interests of her son against the school commission, added the appeal court.

“With children suffering from an intellectual deficiency that prevents them from protecting their own rights, parents are, in some respects, a way to palliate this handicap, and can be considered as the victims of the discriminatory treatment endured by their child,” said the appeal court.

But warns Bernard Jacob, a lawyer with Morency Avocats who plead the case for the Montreal School Commission, the decision does not necessarily mean that the parents of a child who suffered discrimination will themselves always be granted damages. “It’s far from automatic,” said Jacob, an expert in education law. “The ruling states that there must be evidence that the parents themselves suffered harm – that’s what’s important.”

The unanimous ruling has even wider implications for the educational sector in Quebec. The Quebec appeal court once again rejected the notion that schools face a peremptory norm that compels them to integrate and accommodate handicapped children into the mainstream school system. And just as importantly, it reaffirmed that it falls upon the Quebec Human Rights Commission to prove that a school commission did not respect the interests of a handicapped child.

“The Quebec appeal court seized the opportunity to clarify the issue of burden of proof which is how the Quebec Human Rights Commission more or less insidiously sought to reintroduce the notion that there should be a peremptory or quasi-peremptory norm that presumes discrimination has occurred unless the (handicapped) child is in the mainstream school system,” noted Montreal lawyer Yann Bernard with Langlois Avocats who represents school boards.

The Quebec Human Rights Commission argued that the Quebec Human Rights Tribunal erred by imposing on it the burden of proving that the school commission did not act in the interests of a handicapped child. It further argued that two previous rulings issued by the appeal court contradict each other, with one (Commission scolaire des Phares c. Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse 2006 QCCA 82) maintaining that integrating a child is not a peremptory norm while a more recent one (Commission scolaire des Phares c. Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse 2012 QCCA 988) asserting that integration is a goal that school commissions should prioritize.

The Quebec appeal court rejected the arguments, pointing out that the Tribunal “reconciled” both Quebec previous appeal court rulings, both of which followed guidance issued by the SCC in Eaton v. Brant County Board of Education, [1997] 1 SCR 241. In Eaton, the SCC held that while integration should be recognized as the norm of general application because of the benefits it generally provides, a presumption in favour of integrated schooling would work to the disadvantage of pupils who require special education in order to achieve equality.

The Tribunal therefore correctly held that the interests of the child outweigh the presumption of general application, said the appeal court. It follows then that a school commission must evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the student as well as assess the advantages the student may acquire from attending regular class. When the school commission concludes that integration into a regular school setting may prove to be beneficial to the student, it must integrate the child by implementing necessary accommodations, so long as those accommodations do not represent an undue burden to the school commission. The Tribunal also correctly found that it is up to the Quebec Human Rights Commission to prove, based on the balance of probabilities, that the school commission acted in a discriminatory fashion when it decides not to integrate a child into mainstream schooling.

“The fundamental objective behind this exercise is the interest of the child,” said Jacob. “The Quebec Human Rights Commission sought to force school commissions to prove that specialized schooling was in the best interest of the student. We argued that it was up to the Commission to demonstrate that regular classes with necessary accommodations was in the best interests of the student. So in terms of burden of proof, this is an important decision.”

The Quebec Human Rights Commission is considering filing an application for leave to appeal before the SCC. It maintains that it should be up to school commissions to prove that the decision that they made regarding the kind of schooling that a handicapped student receives is in the best interests of the child. “They made the decision, and they have all of the information when they evaluated the child,” said Clément-Major.

This story was originally published in The Lawyers Weekly.