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View cases - Stewart McKelvey

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constitutionalize collective bargaining in order for the association to be “meaningful”. Themajority concluded that without a legislated right to collective bargaining, and withoutconstitutional protection of terms of the collective agreement in that case, the formation of anassociation was meaningless.[155] This sentiment was an express break from Dunmore because the majority in HealthServices focussed on the goals of an association and the enhancement of those goals, rather than2011 SCC 20 (CanLII)the ability of the claimants to associate (which they already had done). Constitutionalizingcollective bargaining therefore cannot be said to safeguard the ability to associate, but instead isconcerned with “enhanc[ing] the exercise of a fundamental freedom,” which cannot form thebasis of a Charter claim (Dunmore, at para. 39). This express break from Dunmore is found inthe reasons of the Chief Justice and LeBel J., where they suggest that providing associationalprotections in the AEPA without also enshrining good faith bargaining would “render theassociational process effectively useless” (para. 54). This break from Dunmore is alsorecognized in the reasons of my colleague Abella J., where she observes that Health Servicesresulted in “creating a completely different jurisprudential universe” from that found in theprevious “Dunmore ‘right to organize’ template” (paras. 324 and 325).[156] It is this shift from protecting what is necessary to exercise the freedom to associate,to constitutionalizing the goals of an association — that is, negotiating a collective agreement —which results in Health Services being inconsistent with the ruling in Dunmore. The majority inHealth Services found that the freedom of association is meaningless unless the government alsoimposes a duty on employers to bargain in good faith, and protects the fruits of that bargaining

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