On November 4, 2017, RavenLaw participated in the 6^th annual Workers’ Bowl, an annual fundraiser in Toronto for the Workers’ Action Centre, a worker-based organization that advocates for fair working conditions for vulnerable workers. The Workers’ Action Centre has a Workers’ Rights Info Line that workers can call for support, offers workshops on workers’ rights and is part of the campaign to raise the minimum wage to $15.

The bowling tournament is hosted by the Ontario Employment Education & Research Centre (OEERC), a non-profit that works with community partners such as the Workers’ Action Centre to educate workers on their rights and provide supports to workers whose rights have been violated.

This is the second year that the RavenLaw team – Wassim Garzouzi, Morgan Rowe, Anna Lichty, and Marlee Olson – has joined bowlers from unions and union-side labour firms, among other supporters, to help raise funds for these important initiatives.

On October 31, 2017, RavenLaw appeared before the Supreme Court of Canada to argue in support of a Charter challenge to certain restrictive portions of Québec’s pay equity legislation.

In particular, in 2009, the Québec government made changes to its pay equity law which required employers to review their wage rates every five years to determine whether changes to wages had resulted in wage discrimination. However, the 2009 amendments to the Pay Equity Act also prevented affected employees from claiming any remedy for discrimination that occurred in between the five-year reviews.

Before the Supreme Court, unions, workers, and pay equity and women’s organizations joined together to argue that these amendments resulted in ongoing discrimination against women and breached their Charter rights.

Andrew Raven, Andrew Astritis, and Morgan Rowe from RavenLaw appeared on behalf of the intervener, the Public Service Alliance of Canada.

RavenLaw was proud to support the Annual Ottawa Women’s Legal Education and Action Fund (LEAF) Persons Day Breakfast, held on October 13, 2017. This year’s breakfast focused on the experiences of Indigenous and racialized women in Canada and the importance of their place in the feminist movement.

LEAF is a charitable non-profit organization that works to advance the equality rights of women and girls in Canada. The annual fundraising breakfast commemorates the Persons Case – the October 18, 1929 decision of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council that ruled that women were to be considered persons under the law and should be eligible to sit in the Canadian Senate. Proceeds from the Persons Day breakfast contribute to LEAF’s litigation efforts and help to sustain equality education programs such as LEAF at Work, the Only Yes Means Yes Campaign, and the Reproductive Justice Campaign.

On November 30, 2017, Morgan Rowe will present at the 3rd Annual Council of Canadians with Disabilities Conference. This year, the conference will be addressing the duty to accommodate. Morgan will be presenting on issues related to accommodating disabilities in education.

CCD is a national human rights organization of people with disabilities working for an inclusive and accessible Canada.

For more information or to register, please visit the conference’s event page.

On October 11, 2017, Morgan Rowe spoke to University of Ottawa students as part of the “Introduction to the Study of Law” class. She presented on issues related to the life of an employment contract, from formation to termination, as well as workers’ rights during employment. Morgan specifically addressed issues that arise when employment contracts conflict with the Employment Standards Act.

On October 18, 2017, James Cameron will present at the Canadian Institute’s Disability Insurance Conference. James will be discussing litigation strategies in LTD benefit claims, specifically addressing strategies for streamlining the litigation process and how to present your case to achieve best outcomes in a timely and cost-effective manner.

For more information or to register for the conference, please visit the Canadian Institute’s conference website.

RavenLaw gratefully acknowledges the contribution of this post by articling student Marlee Olson

Even before Canada became a nation 150 years ago, workers in Canada were fighting for their rights. Although labour rights activists have had a lot to celebrate over the years, it has been a long and arduous journey. In honour of Labour Day as well as Canada’s 150^th birthday this year, here are some of the highlights of the Canadian labour movement.

In the late 1700s, workers in Canada began congregating to demand fair wages in exchange for their labour. The government responded by putting laws into place making it a criminal offence to participate in trade unions. As a result, unions had no way to enforce contracts with employers to receive what they had been promised. The birth of the nation in 1867 was followed shortly after by the birth of the Canadian Labour Union, a political organization of unions that fought against the criminal sanctions imposed on trade unions. Despite this step forward, unions and employees still had no way to legally oppose employers, who would administer harsh discipline and demand 60-hour work weeks.

Several new laws in the early 1900s helped to ease the path to unionization in Canada, with union membership increasing at the start of WWI. After the war, the labour movement experienced several setbacks, including the violent crackdown on the famous Winnipeg General Strike. Although union membership decreased throughout the Great Depression, the period leading up to WWII saw unionism increase once again. The 1937 strike at General Motors in Oshawa is considered by many to be the birth of industrial unionism in Canada. After this, there was more pressure on the government to give legal protection to union members, but there were still no legal repercussions for employers who refused to cooperate.

Union membership doubled during WWII thanks to increased reliance on the work force. In 1944, the federal government implemented a wartime national labour relations law called PC 1003. This law finally placed obligations on both the employer and the union, and put into place many of the tenets of labour law that we still see today. Although repealed shortly after the end of the war, most provinces passed laws resembling PC 1003, including features like union recognition, the duty to bargain in good faith, and strict regulation of strikes. These rights were later extended to federal public service employees following the 1965 strike of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.

Although PC 1003 was the first legislation to provide unions and workers with clear legal protection, it has certainly not been the only law to do so. Occupational health and safety legislation started coming to effect across the country in the 1970s. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, enacted in 1982, has entrenched the constitutional freedom of association. This right was interpreted by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2007 to include the right of employees to associate to achieve workplace goals without employer interference. The Supreme Court further held in 2015 that the constitutional right to freedom of association also includes the right to strike.

The labour movement in Canada has seen many victories throughout the past two centuries—workers have gone from risking arrest simply for participating in a union to having a constitutionally recognized right to strike. Although labour activists have made great strides, there are still many more hurdles in the path.  As we look back on the accomplishments throughout the years, we must also look forward to the challenges yet to come, as we continue to work towards fair and equitable working conditions for all.

[This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice, which cannot be given without consideration of your individual circumstances.]

A group of former members of the Canadian Armed Forces, represented by Raven, Cameron, Ballantyne & Yazbeck LLP have launched a class action lawsuit on behalf of women and men who experienced sexual assault or sexual harassment in their service with the Canadian military. The lawsuit was initiated on Monday, November 28, 2016, when a Notice of Action was filed in Ontario Superior Court.

The plaintiffs, Amy Graham, Nadine Schultz-Nielsen, and Larry Beattie, are members of It’s Just 700, a Canada-wide online resource and peer support group for survivors of Military Sexual Trauma (MST). The group decided to bring a class action against the Canadian Armed Forces, in an effort to change a system that condones sexual misconduct and punishes victims instead of perpetrators. The claim alleges that the Armed Forces have systemically failed to prevent and protect against sexual assault and sexual harassment, including by discouraging victims from reporting, failing to investigate reported incidents, and retaliating against members who come forward.

The group filed the lawsuit on the same day that Statistics Canada revealed the results of its survey on sexual misconduct in the Armed Forces. The survey found that 1.7% of regular force and 2.6% of reserve force members had reported experiencing sexual assault in the past 12 months. More than one quarter of female members reported experiencing sexual assault at some point in their military career. Because the survey excluded any members who were on courses or had been released, and because of the continued stigma associated with reporting, there is good reason to believe the actual rates of sexual misconduct are much higher than found in the survey.

Watch for further updates on the class action lawsuit on the Raven Law website.

If you or a family member are a current or former member of the Canadian Armed Forces who has experienced sexual assault or sexual harassment in the military, you can contact our firm at armedforcesclassaction@ravenlaw.com. 

For media inquiries, please contact Andrew Raven at 613-567-2902 or araven@ravenlaw.com.

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Ravenlaw is pleased to welcome Kim Patenaude and Wassim Garzouzi into the partnership, effective January 1, 2017. Both Kim and Wassim began their careers with Ravenlaw and have made significant contributions to the firm.

Kim is fluently bilingual and provides practical advice and representation to individual clients on issues such as wrongful dismissal, constructive dismissal, severance packages, employment contracts, non-compete clauses, long term disability benefit claims, WSIB/Workers’ compensation, discrimination, harassment, and accommodation. Kim has acted in matters before federal and provincial courts, boards, tribunals, and arbitrators on behalf of public and private sector unions, and employees.

Wassim maintains a robust bilingual practice dedicated exclusively to the representation of unions and their members in all areas of labour relations. Wassim specialises in arbitration proceedings and regularly appears before labour and arbitration boards across the country. He was elected by his peers to serve as Regional Vice-President for the Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers and is a Part-Time Professor at the University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Law, where he teaches the advanced Labour Law course.

We thank Kim and Wassim for their important work in advancing union and worker rights, and congratulate them on becoming partners.