B.C. teachers’ union wins landmark appeal at Supreme Court

The Globe and Mail quoted Joel Bakan, a UBC law professor, after the Supreme Court of Canada sided with the B.C. Teachers’ Federation in a court battle over the right to negotiate classroom conditions.

Bakan said in recent cases, the court has been consistently protecting workers’ rights under the Charter, including the rights to unionize, strike and bargain collectively.

“So there just wasn’t a lot of argument on the other side … the seven majority judges looked at it and said, ‘We’ve spoken already, we’ve articulated what the law is, we don’t need to do it again,’” Bakan said.