The City of Toronto applied for judicial review of WSIAT decisions granting breast cancer benefits to three communications dispatchers under the firefighter occupational disease presumption.
The WSIAT had ruled that evidence of the dispatchers' lack of exposure to fire suppression hazards could not be considered to rebut the presumption.
The Divisional Court found this interpretation unreasonable, as it contradicted the plain meaning of the statute and the binding WSIB policy, which allowed the presumption to be rebutted by evidence that employment was not a significant contributing factor.
The WSIAT decisions were quashed and the original WSIB decisions denying benefits were restored.
