Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• A three-day disciplinary suspension was imposed on employee Daniel Duchene by Hydro-Québec after GPS data showed he drove an employer-owned vehicle at 155 km/h for more than 30 seconds on August 5, 2020.
• Central to the dispute is whether GPS data could lawfully be used to support disciplinary measures under clause 38.01 of the collective agreement, which restricts electronic surveillance to protecting company property against harmful acts.
• The arbitrator's decision to admit the GPS evidence and dismiss the union's grievance was challenged on judicial review before the Superior Court of Québec.
• Reasonableness review under Vavilov was the applicable standard, requiring the arbitral decision to be justified, intelligible, and transparent.
• Insufficient reasoning was the primary flaw identified: the arbitrator failed to adequately explain his departure from established arbitral jurisprudence, particularly the prior decision of arbitrator L'Heureux interpreting the same clause.
• Unaddressed also was the union's argument that continuous GPS monitoring constitutes an unreasonable working condition under section 46 of the Québec Charter.

Facts of the case

This case arises from a disciplinary dispute between the Syndicat des technologues d'Hydro-Québec, section locale 957 (SCFP-FTQ) (the Union) and Hydro-Québec (the Employer) concerning a three-day suspension imposed on employee Daniel Duchene. In 2019, Hydro-Québec installed a GPS system connected to an onboard computer in all of its vehicles, designed to promote safe driving and protect company property. The system was programmed to generate a report whenever a driver exceeded 120 km/h for more than 30 seconds. Duchene had been informed of both the Employer's policy and the GPS system prior to the events at issue. On August 6, 2020, a report was generated indicating that a vehicle owned by Hydro-Québec and driven by Duchene had travelled at 155 km/h for more than 30 seconds the previous day, between 8:44:50 a.m. and 8:45:37 a.m. Duchene contested the reading, prompting the Employer to seek verification from a technical engineer, who confirmed the reliability of the GPS data. Arbitrator François Hamelin found the technical evidence "very solid," dismissed the employee's contrary testimonial evidence, and by decision dated March 7, 2024 rejected both the Union's preliminary objection to the admissibility of the GPS data and the grievance itself. The Union then brought an application for judicial review before the Superior Court of Québec.

Contractual clauses at issue

The central contractual provision in dispute was clause 38.01 of the collective agreement, appearing under the heading "Surveillance et vie privée" (Surveillance and Privacy). The clause provides that electronic monitoring, observation, and listening systems are to be used for the purpose of protecting the company against harmful acts such as theft, fraud, vandalism, and property damage, and that data collected through such systems cannot be used to support disciplinary measures except where the conduct falls within those same categories of harmful acts. Clause 38.02 further prohibits any intrusion into an employee's privacy by such systems beyond the purposes set out in clause 38.01. The Union argued that the GPS data did not fall within the permitted uses under clause 38.01 and that the Employer was required to establish reasonable grounds before resorting to employee surveillance, consistent with established arbitral jurisprudence and the Bridgestone line of cases from the Court of Appeal.

Reasoning and analysis

The Superior Court applied the reasonableness standard of review as established by the Supreme Court of Canada in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65, a standard both parties agreed was applicable and which the Court confirmed was appropriate given the absence of any exception to the presumption. The Court's task was to assess whether the arbitral decision was founded on internally coherent reasoning and was justified in light of the relevant legal and factual constraints.

The Court identified two central deficiencies in the arbitrator's reasoning. First, the arbitrator dismissed the Union's preliminary objection and the precedent set by arbitrator Joëlle L'Heureux — who had applied clause 38.01 to require the employer to establish reasonable grounds before using electronic data for disciplinary purposes — on the sole basis that the text of clause 38.01 does not require the Employer to demonstrate "reasons" before using GPS data. The Court found this reasoning inadequate. A well-established line of arbitral jurisprudence, including decisions by arbitrators Marcheterre (2009), Nadeau (2010), Sabourin (2012), and Martin (2015), had consistently evaluated the existence of reasonable grounds for surveillance under the same or equivalent clauses, as well as the justification for any privacy intrusion. The Bridgestone decision of the Court of Appeal similarly required that surveillance be grounded in reasonable motives and means. The arbitrator made no effort to distinguish these authorities on the facts, nor did he engage with the privacy dimensions of the surveillance or the fundamental rights issues at stake. While the Court acknowledged that there may be meaningful factual distinctions between the L'Heureux case — which involved a handheld microcomputer used to investigate suspected time theft — and the present matter, where the system generated automated speed reports without real-time tracking, the arbitrator himself drew none of those distinctions, and the Court could not supply the reasoning in his place.

Second, the arbitrator failed entirely to address the Union's argument that the use of GPS constituted continuous employee surveillance amounting to an unreasonable working condition under section 46 of the Québec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms. The Court noted that while a decision-maker is not required to respond to every argument, the failure to engage with a party's principal legal arguments — particularly those touching on fundamental rights — undermines the intelligibility and justification of the decision as a whole. The Court observed that a subsequent arbitral decision by arbitrator Michel Duranleau (rendered after the decision under review) had addressed similar issues with explicit and detailed reasoning, further illustrating the analytical gap in the impugned decision. The cumulative effect of both deficiencies rendered the arbitrator's motivation so summary and incomplete as to be unreasonable.

Ruling and overall outcome

The Superior Court, per Justice David E. Roberge, allowed the Union's application for judicial review by judgment dated June 5, 2026. The arbitral decision of arbitrator François Hamelin dated March 7, 2024 was quashed, and the matter was remitted to a new arbitrator to render a decision on grievance 2020-R03-581 in conformity with the law, following a fresh arbitration. The Syndicat des technologues d'Hydro-Québec, section locale 957 (SCFP-FTQ) was the successful party. Costs were awarded; however, no specific monetary amount was stated in the judgment.