Robert Vinodolac v. Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board and Joanna Boudreau, 2009 HRTO 1055

HUMAN RIGHTS TRIBUNAL OF ONTARIO

B E T W E E N:

Robert Vinodolac Applicant

-and-

Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board and Joanna Boudreau Respondents

INTERIM DECISION

Adjudicator: Brian Eyolfson Date: July 16, 2009 Citation: 2009 HRTO 1055 Indexed as: Vinodolac v. Dufferin Peel Catholic District School Board

1In this Application filed on March 20, 2009 under section 34 of Part IV of the Human Rights Code, R.S.O. 1990, c. H.19 as amended (the “Code”), the applicant alleges that he was subjected to sexual harassment and solicitation or advances in employment.

2In his Application, the applicant indicates that the facts of the Application are part of a grievance proceeding that is in progress and requests that the Tribunal defer his Application until the grievance proceeding is completed. In their Response to the Application, the respondents also request that the Application be deferred pending the completion of the grievance proceeding. This Interim Decision deals with the issue of whether the Application should be deferred.

3The respondents enclosed with their Response a copy of a grievance, dated February 10, 2008, filed on behalf of the applicant by the Ontario English Catholic Teachers’ Association. The grievance alleges that the respondent Board’s management has carried out a pattern of harassment against the applicant. The respondents submit that the grievance relates to the material matters at issue in the Application.

4Pursuant to Rule 14.1 of the Tribunal’s Rules of Procedure, the Tribunal may defer consideration of an application, on such terms as it may determine, on its own initiative, at the request of an applicant under Rule 7, or at the request of any party. The Tribunal has stated that deferral is not automatically invoked simply because the parties are involved in other legal proceedings. It is a discretionary measure that the Tribunal exercises on the basis of the circumstances in each case. Absent good reason, applicants and respondents before the Tribunal are entitled to expect the Tribunal to take timely action to resolve complaints of discrimination brought before it.

5The Tribunal has generally deferred applications where there is an ongoing grievance under a collective agreement based on the same facts and human rights issues. In explaining this approach, the Tribunal has referred to the fact that the Supreme Court of Canada has affirmed that grievance arbitrators have not only the power but also the responsibility to implement and enforce the substantive rights and obligations of human rights and other employment-related statutes as if they were part of the collective agreement (Parry Sound Social Services Administration Board v. O.P.S.E.U., Local 342, 2003 SCC 42).

6The Supreme Court thus confirmed that human rights tribunals are not the only decision-makers that can decide human rights claims. Where the parties are already engaged in a concurrent legal proceeding in which they are raising the same human rights issues before a decision-making body with the authority to make determinations about those issues, the orderly administration of justice favours deferral to the other proceeding. In such a scenario, Tribunal’s normal approach is to defer to the other proceeding (Blackman v. Ontario (Community Safety and Correctional Services), 2009 HRTO 970).

7In the present case, the applicant has a grievance that is proceeding based on substantially the same facts as the Application. There are no circumstances that would cause the Tribunal to depart from its normal approach and both the applicant and the respondents have requested deferral.

8The Tribunal determines that it is appropriate to defer the Application pending completion of the grievance proceeding.

9The Tribunal directs the parties’ attention to Rules 14.3 and 14.4 which outline how the Application may be brought back on after the conclusion of the grievance process.

10I am not seized.