Tamara Ramusovic and Natasha Edgar, on behalf of the Union, successfully defended a judicial review petition seeking to overturn a labour arbitrator’s decision. The BC Supreme Court dismissed the employer’s petition for reason of undue delay in filing the petition with the Court. Although there were no applicable statutory timeframes for the filing of the petition, we successfully argued that in the circumstances of the case, the employer’s delay in seeing judicial relief was unreasonable and undermined the proper functioning of labour dispute resolution in general, and the parties’ contractual choices about how to resolve their disputes under their collective agreement.
Delta Cement v. International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Local Lodge D277 (Roller Mill Contracting Out Grievance), January 16, 2020 (unreported) (McPhillips)
Richard Edgar and Natasha Edgar, on behalf of the Union, successfully argued that the employer was in breach of the Collective Agreement when it contracted out maintenance work. This decision ended many years of improper contracting out by the Employer which was undermining of the bargaining unit.
Employee v. Employer, 2020 BCHRT 4
In this case, Sara Hanson successfully argued that the Employer’s application to dismiss the Employee’s Complaint for having no reasonable prospect of success should be denied. The Employer argued that it had acted “objectively reasonably” in responding to the Employee’s complaint that she was sexually assaulted by her co-worker. However, the Tribunal accepted the Employee’s argument that there was very little evidence that the Employer had a suitable anti‐discrimination/harassment policy, a proper complaint mechanism, or adequate training given to management and employees. Importantly, the Tribunal also dismissed the Employer’s argument that it had fulfilled its duty to the Employee because its observations of her “day to day” demeanour suggested that she was fine, and in doing so, stated that “reliance on observations of the Employee’s demeanour harkens to harmful stereotypes about the ideal sexual assault victim who can only be believed if visibly traumatized.”
Lhoist North America of Canada Inc. v. Cement, Lime and Gypsum Division of the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Lodge D486 (Belanger Termination), December 14, 2019 (unreported) (Gregory)
Tamara Ramusovic and Natasha Edgar, on behalf of the Union, successfully grieved the termination of the grievor for sleeping on the job. The arbitrator ordered the grievor reinstated to his previous position.
YVR Enviroshred (Shredwise) v. CUPW, Local 739 Fraser Valley West, B148/2019
Reconsideration of BCLRB Decision No. B48/2019. The Original Panel’s conclusion that Local 739 met the Provincial Character requirement was rationally and reasonably supported by the evidence, and the Original Panel made its finding the finding was made in a manner consistent with the evidentiary onus required of Local 739 as a long-standing BC local of a well-known national union.