The Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA) has won a precedent-setting arbitration that affects how breast-feeding employees are treated in the workplace.

Arbitrator John Moreau has ruled that Carewest engaged in gender/sex discrimination when it failed to accommodate a breast-feeding employee. The decision sets a precedent because it requires all employers to accommodate such employees. Moreau ordered Carewest to reinstate the employee who was dismissed and pay her 16 months back pay and benefits.

Doris DeGagne worked part-time as a Recreation Therapist at the Carewest Cross Bow, a continuing care facility in Calgary. She asked for a 6-month extension to her maternity leave so she could continue to breastfeed her child at home. However, DeGagne was refused even though her job-share partner agreed to continue working full time during the extension.

Since Carewest did not offer to accommodate DeGagne to enable her to breast-feed at work, she decided to stay at home. After two grievance meetings, DeGagne was dismissed for not reporting for work. At the arbitration hearing, HSAA claimed the dismissal was unjust and that the employer’s refusal to accommodate amounted to sex discrimination.

"The arbitrator says employers have an obligation to accommodate breast feeding employees. This reaffirms the tremendous value breast feeding has on the health of mothers, their babies and society at large," said Elisabeth Ballermann, president of HSAA.

In his decision, Moreau says, "breast feeding in my view is as intimately connected to child birth as pregnancy is to child birth and should be safeguarded in the same way. I therefore agree that discrimination on the basis that a woman is breast feeding is a form of sex discrimination."

The decision is the first of its kind in Canada.

HSAA is a union that represents more than 10,000 professional, technical and support workers in the health care system.

(Health Sciences Association of Alberta News Release – January 18, 2001)