Case information

Civil procedure — Class actions — Compensatory damages — Recovery method — Proposed changes to construction workers’ working conditions leading to disruption of work on construction sites — Workers and employers bringing class action for damage caused by work stoppage — Superior Court finding that strike was illegal and that union had committed fault of omission — Court of Appeal intervening to order individual recovery of damages rather than collective recovery — Whether application for leave to appeal raises question of public importance.

Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch). Please note that summaries are not provided to the Judges of the Court. They are placed on the Court file and website for information purposes only.

A class action was brought against the respondent, FTQ-Construction (“FTQ”), the largest Quebec union federation of workers in the construction industry, to determine whether it was liable for damage caused to a series of workers and employers (“applicants”) as a result of the disruption and closure of construction sites in October 2011. The disruption followed the introduction of a provincial bill whose purpose was to change the working conditions of construction workers. The FTQ launched a campaign to oppose the bill after it was introduced. The trial judge found that the strike by the workers who had left the construction sites, thereby causing their closure, was illegal. He also found that the FTQ was at fault for failing to take the necessary steps to end the illegal strike as quickly as possible. The Court of Appeal upheld those findings, but it struck out the amount awarded and ordered the individual recovery of compensatory damages by the workers. In its view, the expert evidence did not allow a sufficiently precise determination of the total claim amount.