Clinton Cloarec v. Edward Skinner, 2013 HRTO 1439

HUMAN RIGHTS TRIBUNAL OF ONTARIO

B E T W E E N:

Clinton Cloarec

Applicant

-and-

Edward Skinner

Respondent

decision

Adjudicator: Mary Truemner

Date: August 22, 2013

Citation: 2013 HRTO 1439

Indexed as: Cloarec v. Skinner

wRITTEN SUBMISSIONS

Clinton Cloarec, Applicant ) Self-represented

INTRODUCTION

1This is an Application filed under section 34 of Part IV of the Human Rights Code, R.S.O. 1990, c. H.19, as amended (the “Code”), alleging discrimination in employment on the basis of disability. The applicant alleges that his disability was one of the reasons for which the respondent terminated his employment.

BACKGROUND

2The Application was filed on July 2, 2013, and indicates that the date of the last incident of discrimination occurred on September 12, 2007, when the respondent terminated the applicant’s employment.

3On July 18, 2013, the Tribunal issued to the applicant a Notice of Intent to Dismiss (“NOID”) because it appears the Tribunal has no jurisdiction given that the Application was filed more than one year after the incident of discrimination, and there appear to be no facts to indicate that the delay was in good faith.

4The applicant filed submissions in response to the NOID, stating that the reason for the delay is that he is virtually blind, and that legal counsel is not “readily available” in the town of Midland where he lives, but he does not explain why being blind could cause a delay of approximately six years, nor does he explain why, if he felt he needed a lawyer, he could not have waited for an appointment with one in his town within a year of losing his employment.

ANALYSIS WITH RESPECT TO DELAY

5Section 34(1) of the Code provides that an Application must be filed within one year of the incident to which the Application relates, or within one year of the last incident in a series of events. Subsection 34(2) allows for a filing of an Application outside of the time limit if the Tribunal is satisfied that the delay was incurred in good faith and no substantial prejudice will result to any of the respondents.

6I am satisfied that the last incident of alleged discrimination in this case occurred in 2007, well over a year before the applicant filed the Application in 2013.

7The Tribunal can accept an Application that is untimely if it is satisfied that the delay was incurred in good faith and no substantial prejudice would result from accepting the Application. To show that a delay was incurred in good faith, the applicant must provide a reasonable explanation for his failure to pursue his rights under the Code in a timely manner. The applicant does not provide a reasonable explanation. He does not explain why his problems seeing caused him to wait almost six years to file an Application. Simply stating that lawyers in Midland were “not readily available” is not any kind of explanation to justify waiting almost six years to file an Application. In the context of the applicant’s silence with respect to any frustrated efforts to make appointments with them or with lawyers at the Human Rights Legal Support Centre, a provincial organization which could provide advice over the telephone, I find that the applicant has not met the onus on him to demonstrate that the delay in filing his Application was “incurred in good faith” as required under the Code.

8In the absence of a good faith reason for the delay, it is not necessary for me to consider whether substantial prejudice would result from the delay: Esanu v. Georgetown Men’s Non-Contact Hockey League, 2009 HRTO 579.

ORDER

9The Application is dismissed.