Steven Nelson v. Haydon Youth Services, 2009 CanLII 37951

Pay Equity Hearings Tribunal

File No.: 3544-08-PE Date: 2009-04-22

Steven Nelson, Applicant v. Haydon Youth Services, Respondent.

Before: Diane L. Gee, Chair, Margaret Kvetan and Catherine Bickley, Members.

Decision of the Tribunal: April 22, 2009

Decision

1This matter is an application to the Pay Equity Hearings Tribunal (the "Tribunal") filed by Steven Nelson on his own behalf as well as on behalf of several other individuals. Additional individuals have contacted the Tribunal and asked to be advised of developments in this file. As a result, the Tribunal considers all of the following individuals to be interested parties who are entitled to participate in a pre-hearing conference:

Philip Fehr Richard Bouwhuis Marie Alsop Gary Lafoy Ernest Moignard Donald Verge Desmond Johnson Brad Harnum

2By way of background, the Pay Equity Commission has issued two orders involving Haydon Youth Services ("Haydon"). The first order was made on March 4, 2005. This order was made under subsection 21.12(2) of the Pay Equity Act, R.S.O 1990, c. P.7 as amended (the "Act") and declared Haydon to be a seeking employer for the purpose of using the proxy method of comparison in accordance with the requirements of Part III.2 of the Act. On the same day, the Commission issued a second order under subsections 24(1) and 34(3)(c) of the Act in which Haydon was directed to prepare a pay equity plan using the proxy method of comparison with the job classes of Child Care Worker and Part-time Child Care Worker as female dominated job classes. The second order further directs Haydon to post the plan and, following a period of time during which the employees could make comments on the plan, states that the plan will be deemed approved. Haydon did not challenge either order by way of an application to the Tribunal.

3There appear to be two aspects to the application filed with the Tribunal by Mr. Nelson. First, the application states that employees of Haydon filed a complaint with the Pay Equity Commission in December 2003 and that, following an investigation, certain orders were made against Haydon. The application states that Haydon has not complied with these orders. By way of remedy, the application asks that the orders made against Haydon be enforced. Second, the application refers to cheques "from Ceredian and COMSOC being received by Haydon for Pay Equity disbursement to employees" and states that the employees never received the money. The application asks that "the Pay Equity Commission look into why the employees did not receive the monies entitled to them through the checks [sic] sent to Haydon to ensure pay equity."

4By way of response to this application, Haydon states that it is a private company and cannot be lumped in with other public sector agencies and denies that it received funds from the Ministry of Community and Social Services to increase any salaries. Haydon states that a number of the applicants are "deliberately misleading the Pay Equity Commission and put them to the strictest proof to prove their statements." As indicated above, Hayden has never challenged the two Orders issued by the Commission.

5Having reviewed this file, the Tribunal has determined that a pre-hearing conference should be held in order to provide the parties with some guidance and direction on issues such as: which of the issues raised by the parties fall within the Tribunal's jurisdiction; which issues Haydon can raise in the absence of having filed its own application in which it challenges one or both of the Orders issued by the Commission; and how the various issues are to be dealt with by the Tribunal. Further, the pre-hearing conference will be used to determine which individuals intend to participate in this matter. All discussions which occur during the pre-hearing conference are off the record and may not be referred to or relied upon at a hearing unless reduced to writing and signed by the parties in the form of a Pre-Hearing Conference Memorandum.

6In this case, Haydon has not yet been directed by the Tribunal to file its response to Mr. Nelson's April 8, 2009 application as it is the Tribunal's view that such a response would be most usefully filed after the pre-hearing conference is held.

7Accordingly, a pre-hearing conference has been scheduled for July 16, 2009. The pre-hearing conference will be held at the Tribunal's premises located at 505 University Avenue, 2nd floor, Toronto, Ontario, M5G 2P1. The pre-hearing conference will commence at 9:30 a.m. Anyone listed above who does not attend at the pre-hearing conference, or send a representative to represent them, may not receive further notice of these proceedings.