We are bringing an age discrimination claim on behalf of a senior lawyer against a leading inter-national law firm, which we say is forcing his retirement. The Human Rights Tribunal has dismissed the law firm’s challenge to our age discrimination claim. As the Tribunal stated “the parties agree that Mr. McCormick is a skilled lawyer who does legal work of high quality”. As lawyers for Mr. McCormick, we advance claims including a claim that the law-firm’s mandatory retirement rules and related conduct discriminate on the basis of age. The respondent firm sought to strike out our claim without a hearing on the grounds that the Tribunal has no jurisdiction. All of their grounds of objection were dismissed.
The respondent law firm has now commenced a BC Supreme Court action seeking to overturn the decision of the Tribunal.