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A Supreme Court Canada decision has ruled in favour of three female Royal Canadian Mounted Police employees who reportedly faced pension plan discrimination. The Court has determined the pension plan was discriminating against women and parents.
RCMP Pension Plan Discriminates Says Supreme Court
On Oct. 16, 2020, CBC News reported the Supreme Court of Canada released a decision finding the RCMP pension plan discriminatory and ruled in favour of three retired female Mounties.
The Supreme Court ruled the organization’s policy breaches the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, after years of legal challenges against RCMP pension plan discrimination.
The plaintiffs, Joanne Fraser, Colleen Fox, and Allison Pilgrim argued they were being discriminated against because they were not able to buy back their lost pension contributions while working part-time to support their families.
Justice Rosalie Abella’s ruling read in part, “Full-time RCMP members who job-share must sacrifice pension benefits because of a temporary reduction in working hours. This arrangement has a disproportionate impact on women and perpetuates their historical disadvantage.”
Justice Arbella continued, “I agree with Ms. Fraser that the negative pension consequences of job-sharing perpetuate a long-standing source of disadvantage to women: gender biases within pension plans, which have historically been designed ‘for middle and upper-income full-time employees with long service, typically male,” according to CBC News.
The RCMP pension plan discrimination ruling kept in mind that a majority of employees who joined the part-time work program were women who wanted to cut down working hours to take care of their children.
RCMP discrimination is nothing new, as the police organization had several class action lawsuits filed against them. The RCMP has allegedly been a breeding ground for discrimination against women and Indigenous people.
Female Mounties Fight to End RCMP Pension Plan Discrimination
In 2016, the three retired female RCMP officers went to court to argue that the organization’s pension plan was outdated and discriminatory against women.
The three RCMP Mounties hoped the legal action against the pension plan discrimination would bring change to public service pensions, making them more fair and balanced for both sexes.
After returning to their full-time positions, the female Mounties discovered that the hours they worked while part-time did not contribute towards their pensions. When the women tried to “buy back” the pension money they lost during their part-time work, they were not allowed to double up their contributions.
To add to their frustrations, the three women found out that other RCMP employees who were suspended from their positions or took years off of work were allowed to buy back their pension contributions.
Fraser explained, “It doesn’t make sense that someone can be off for a total of five years without contributing to the RCMP at all, yet buy back that full five years of pension,” reported CBC News.
The women’s lawyer, Paul Champ believes the RCMP pension plan discrimination was showing prejudices on the basis of sex and familial status.
Champ noted, “The plan perpetuates the stereotype that it is acceptable for women to fill one of two roles in society — that of caregiver or member of the labour force, but not both at the same time,” according to CBC News.
CBC News wrote, in 1997, job share agreements were allowed within the RCMP. In 2012, a gender-based assessment was designed to accommodate maternity and paternity leave, and part-time positions were also created “to support women and others achieve a better balance in coping with work and family responsibilities.”
A Setback in The Fight to End RCMP Discrimination
In 2017, the Federal Court dismissed the female Mounties’ claims about the RCMP discriminatory pension plans.
The Federal Court decided that the women officers were not discriminated against because they were female or parents. The judge ruled the women had simply faced the consequences of working part-time.
The judge acknowledged that most of the RCMP employees who accepted part-time positions were women with young children, but the judge added that the women had benefited from taking care of their children instead of stressing over child care.
The judge ruled that the alleged pension plan discrimination would be reduced by about five percent because it will hard to come to the conclusion that the effects on the women’s pension were “necessarily adverse,” according to CBC.
Lawyer Paul Champ was disappointed by the ruling. In 2017, Champ wrote an email to CBC News, “The court recognized that care for children disproportionately falls to women in Canada, including women in dual-earner families.”
Champ added, “Hopefully the federal government will take a close look at this decision and recognize that pension plans for RCMP and public service workers need to be reformed to be more equitable for parents who choose to temporarily work part-time to care for their children.”
Ultimately, regardless of not being heard the first time, the Supreme Court of Canada reached its decision that the RCMP was discriminating against women in their pension plan policy.
What do you think about the RCMP pension plan discrimination ruling? Do you believe charter rights were violated? Share how you feel in the comment section below!
The plaintiffs are represented by Paul Champ at Champ & Associates.
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