About JUSTICE@work
About our sponsors
JUSTICE@work is the name of an Ontario employment law practice of Community Legal Clinic – Simcoe, Haliburton, Kawartha Lakes dedicated to serving low-income and disadvantaged workers in Simcoe County, Haliburton County and The City of Kawartha Lakes.
JUSTICE@work is now accepting low-income clients who have been wrongfully dismissed, constructively dismissed, unfairly denied severance pay, exposed to a job related health or safety hazard, or been the victim of discrimination or harassment in the workplace.
Through vigorous advocacy and the enforcement of workers' rights, we aim to effect a culture shift by developing new case law which in turn will benefit the working poor. JUSTICE@work advocates advance cases that meet the program's criteria in court, instead of with the Ministry of Labour pursuant to the Employment Standards Act (ESA).
JUSTICE@work provides employment law services to low income workers across in Simcoe County, Haliburton County and The City of Kawartha Lakes. The program employs lawyers and community legal workers to provide legal advice and representation before courts and tribunals.
JUSTICE@work is dedicated to alleviating poverty by providing legal assistance to low income workers -- breaking the descent into poverty often experienced in the event of a job loss.
JUSTICE@work aims to protect and enforce workers rights, creating safe, fair and equitable workplaces in Simcoe County, Haliburton County and The City of Kawartha Lakes.
JUSTICE@work is committed to empowering workers through education, outreach, advice, brief service and full representation before dispute resolution bodies.
JUSTICE@work seeks to develop worker-friendly common law by presenting employee claims in court.
The workforce continues to change with few built-in mechanisms through which workers can protect themselves:
Enforcing workers rights and empowering workers often requires legal representation. Legal advocacy enables the voices of workers to be heard in courts and tribunals thereby influencing the development of law. Successful advocacy can have a major impact on the lives of workers and on how employers operate, resulting in fair severance for workers and leading to internal policy changes of employers.
Without enforcement, workers' legal rights are illusory. JUSTICE@work is one of few free legal services available to low-income Ontarians who wish to enforce their workplace rights. It is the only provincial program that engages the court system as its primary means of achieving justice and law reform.
Legal Aid Ontario does not provide funding to private employment lawyers for low-income clients. Traditionally, clinics that practice employment law limit their assistance to filing complaints under the ESA and/or political advocacy.
Assisting the working poor with employment law disputes is critical to the alleviation of poverty. Studies conducted in Canada and United Kingdom indicate that a lack of legal assistance to the working poor has a cascading and negative effect throughout all aspects of the client's life. This is because unresolved legal issues often trigger further problems including mental and physical health ailments, social exclusion, dependence on social assistance and relationship breakdown.
The realities of the global economy have caused a significant decline in the number of middle-class manufacturing jobs available in Ontario. These tend to have been replaced by new jobs in the service sector, which are less secure and lower paying. In order to cut costs, large employers have moved away from full-time career jobs to part-time, contracted and temporary workers. Also the percentage of workers in union jobs has fallen steadily.
Among the homeless, women, youth, First Nations and newcomers, the need for representation with employment problems is experienced at even higher rates. These workers are particularly vulnerable to workplace abuses.
Regulatory agencies have difficulty enforcing the protections afforded by the ESA. Also ESA remedies are inadequate compared to those obtainable in court i.e. - a worker due only 8 weeks of termination pay under the ESA could win 8 months of termination pay in court.
By resolving disputes in court, JUSTICE@work is obtaining richer awards for low-income workers who would otherwise be denied access to justice. It is also creating valuable legal precedents.
Critical to our advocacy model is the operation of common law. In Canada judges are bound by interpretations of the law made by other judges. When there is no authoritative statement of the law to apply to a particular case, judges have the authority and duty to make law by issuing reasons for judgment, which set out the legal rule they have applied to the case before the court and other subsequent similar cases.
JUSTICE@work has a policy of pursuing remedies in court because recourse to court generally nets significantly richer awards for our clients than decisions under the administrative regime set out by the ESA. Critically, administrative ESA decisions do not change the law because they are not legally binding on other decision makers. In contrast, Court decisions do become part of the common law affecting all employers and employees. For this reason the culture change and evolution of public policy inherent in decisions won in court are absent from remedies obtained under the Employment Standards Act.
Issue Identification and Law Reform by Enforcement
A large and diverse caseload enables the clinic's litigation team to identify trends, systemic problems and cases important to particularly large or vulnerable groups. For example, the program has recently turned its attention to the recurring challenge poised by employers who seek to evade legal obligations to their employees by entering into consecutive short-term contracts for service. Because of the clinic's case volume, the litigation team can better identify the nature and prevalence of such injustices as well as those cases best suited to the high level of service necessary for complex trial advocacy
Much of the common law to-date has been crafted in the context of disputes between middle to high-income employees and their employers. Not surprisingly, low-income employees rarely litigate, so the courts have had little opportunity to craft decisions on facts unique to the working poor. For example, should special damages be awarded when a poor single parent worker is wrongfully dismissed triggering a downward spiral into greater poverty? In this manner, the court-focused nature of JUSTICE@Work aims to dramatically shift the development of the common law in favour of the working poor by bringing their legal concerns before the courts. Where a merited complaint exists, the program aims to present the matter to court, if feasible. This is because every judicial decision has the capacity to shape the law by interpreting legislation and past court decisions in light of the circumstances of the case.
Strategic Coordination of Like Clients and Issues
At the second stage of the advocacy model, more difficult cases and those affecting large numbers of employees who have similar discrete issues are referred to the Clinic's litigation team for resolution. Litigation team cases are resourced at a higher level in terms of research and communications support and are attended to by a multi-lawyer team. Attention is paid to how the case affects other employees as well as the best interests of the individual complainant.
Law Reform Through Trial and Appellate Advocacy
Finally, where the law relating to a dispute or systemic injustice is entirely absent or unfavourable to the working poor, the matter may be referred to the third stage of the advocacy model as a law reform need. Here the litigation team partners with leading private lawyers, on a pro bono basis, in order to bring actions or applications with the aim of changing or defining the law in a way more favourable to the working poor.