Seneca College v Bhadauria

Seneca College v Bhadauria, [1981] 2 SCR 181 is a leading decision of the Supreme Court of Canada on civil rights and tort law. The Court ruled that there can be no common law tort of discrimination.

Seneca College v Bhadauria
Supreme Court of Canada
Hearing: May 12–13, 1981 Judgment: June 22, 1981
Citations	[1981] 2 SCR 181
Ruling	Appeal allowed.
Court membership
Chief Justice: Bora Laskin Puisne Justices: Ronald Martland, Roland Ritchie, Brian Dickson, Jean Beetz, Willard Estey, William McIntyre, Julien Chouinard, Antonio Lamer
Reasons given
Unanimous reasons by	Laskin CJ
Martland and Ritchie JJ took no part in the consideration or decision of the case.

Background

Bhadauria, an East Indian woman, was qualified to teach in Ontario and had seven years experience. She had applied ten times to Seneca College but was never granted an interview. Bhadauria claimed that she was not interviewed because of her ethnicity.

She argued that the college had violated the common law tort of discrimination. The Court of Appeal for Ontario accepted the existence of such a tort. Since Bhadauria could show that such a right existed and that it had been violated by the practices of the college she would be entitled to remedy.

Decision of the Supreme Court of Canada

The Court allowed the appeal. It held that there was no tort of discrimination in Canadian common law. The court reasoned that a tort of discrimination was unnecessary since Bhadauria already had access to the human rights regime.

External links

• full text of decision at CanLII