There is an irony buried in the way Canadian employment law resolves workplace disputes. We created specialized tribunals, labour arbitrators and administrative processes so employment disputes can be resolved by people who understand them. But when those systems overlap, the employment dispute can generate an entirely new employment dispute about which process gets to decide the first one. The machinery designed to simplify the first dispute creates the second. Linda Horrocks' case makes the irony unusually obvious. She said her employer failed to accommodate her disability and then terminated her employment. Because she was unionized, the termination could be challenged through grievance and arbitration. Because she alleged discrimination, Manitoba's human rights system also appeared to have something to say about it. Before the legal system could finally determine whether her employment rights had been violated, it had to determine which part of the legal system had the right to determine whether her employment rights had been violated. The irony became sharper after a human rights adjudicator had already heard the complaint and found discrimination.
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