What constitutes a breach of s. 15 of the Canadian Human Rights Code?

Violations of s. 15 have not been limited to cases where legislation has had a discriminatory effect. As noted in the foregoing paragraph “government action” has been found to constitute a breach of s. 15. The same can be said for government inaction as well. In the case of Elbridge v. British Columbia (Attorney General), 1997 CanLII 327 (SCC), [1997] 3 S.C.R. 624, it was held that failure of the provincial government to provide sign language interpretation to deaf patients contravened s. 15 by denying them “equal benefit of the law”. Similarly, in Auton, (supra), the failure of the provincial government to provide autistic children with effective early treatment constituted a violation of s 15 which was not saved by s. 1.