Articles of Interest

Girouard v. Canada (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) [2001] F.C.J. No. 63

March 2001

Classification of a Position: Decision of the Federal Court

On January 22, 2001, the Federal Court of Canada, Trial Division, reversed a decision of the Commissioner denying a grievance presented by Superintendent Daniel Girouard. A summary of the case follows.

In 1994, Superintendent Girouard was in charge of an administrative service. Following the amalgamation of his service with another service, the responsibilities of his position increased. His superior officer believed that the position's classification level should be raised, and he asked that the position be reclassified. The classification officer decided not to raise the classification level. Superintendent Girouard presented a grievance. The Level I adjudicator rejected the grievance for the reason that Superintendent Girouard was not aggrieved, as required under subsection 31(1) of the RCMP Act. According to the adjudicator, nothing guaranteed that he would remain in the position or that he would necessarily be promoted if the classification level were raised. Superintendent Girouard submitted his grievance to Level II.

The Committee examined the grievance and found, first, that, for a member, the loss of the opportunity to advance his career represented a prejudice that was sufficient for the purposes of subsection 31(1). The Committee also found that there were deficiencies in the relativity study and that the lack of explanations, as to why the group of duties encompassed by the position was less important than that in the benchmark positions, was such that it represented a fundamental error in procedure. In light of the errors found, the Committee concluded that the classification exercise should be invalidated and a new classification process begun. It recommended that the grievance be upheld. The Commissioner did not, however, accept the Committee's conclusions and recommendations, and denied the grievance. In his view, the reasons given by the classification officers and the relativity study were sufficient. Superintendent Girouard then filed an application for judicial review in the Federal Court of Canada.

Speaking for the Federal Court, Rouleau, J. observed that under the RCMP Act, the Commissioner must give reasons for a decision not to follow the recommendations of the Committee. He further noted that although the Treasury Board's policy on relativity studies requires comparison of the position under study with a number of other positions in the organization concerned, Superintendent Girouard's position was compared to only one position within the RCMP. He found that Superintendent Girouard was entitled to expect the Commissioner to give reasons for departing from established policy. On this subject, Rouleau J. writes:

[Translation] The Commissioner's reasons are rather superficial. A reading of the ERC's conclusions and recommendations shows that the problem with the comparisons pertains more to their quality than to their number. While the Commissioner does refer in his decision to the quality issues identified by the ERC, he does not appear to have addressed them in his conclusions. The ERC raised many problems of a serious nature which, in my view, deserved at the very least an examination by the Commissioner. In rejecting the ERC's recommendations without really explaining his decision, the Commissioner contravened the [RCMP Act] and exceeded his jurisdiction, making his decision subject to review by this Court.

For these reasons, Rouleau J. quashed the Commissioner's decision and ordered the RCMP to conduct a new evaluation of the classification of Superintendent Girouard's position.