Divisional Court Rejects HRTO Decision to Dismiss HRLSC Client’s Application as Abandoned
Fernando Ramirez will have the opportunity to proceed with his application before the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO), after the HRLSC represented him at a judicial review at Divisional Court. In Ramirez v. Rockwell Automation Canada Ltd., 2025 ONSC 1408, the court quashed the HRTO’s decision to dismiss Ramirez’s application, concluding it was unreasonable to assume that he had abandoned his application after missing one email.
In 2019, Ramirez’s HRTO application (which was related to disability and employment) was deferred until the conclusion of a proceeding before the Worker Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). Ramirez maintained regular contact with the HRTO while his application was deferred and provided updates regarding the status of his WSIB proceeding. He responded to one request for information from the HRTO in March 2020 and contacted the HRTO again in April 2021 about his file. In June 2022, the HRTO sent Ramirez an email seeking an update, but he did not receive it and did not respond to it.
After Ramirez did not respond to the June 2022 email, the HRTO dismissed his application as abandoned with no further notice to him (Ramirez v. Rockwell Automation Canada Ltd., 2023 HRTO 1595). Ramirez filed a request for reconsideration of that decision, but the request was denied (Ramirez v. Rockwell Automation Canada Ltd., 2024 HRTO 525).
The HRLSC represented Ramirez at the Divisional Court on an application for judicial review of the HRTO’s decision. On March 7, 2025, the Divisional Court ruled it was unreasonable for the HRTO to find that Ramirez had abandoned his application after missing one email. Instead, the HRTO should have considered the one missed email within the context of his past practice over several years of diligently meeting his obligations to keep the HRTO informed of the status of the WSIB proceeding, which did not support a finding of abandonment.
Ramirez will have the opportunity to proceed with his application before the HRTO after the WSIB proceeding has completed.