An Alberta judge has given approval for Suncor Energy to perform random drug tests on company employees. This is the latest round in the legal battle and it allows Suncor Energy to randomly test for drugs and alcohol use in employees. A ruling in 2014 by an arbitration panel determined that the testing plan would violate union worker privacy and prohibited the company from moving forward with a plan for random drug testing. Court of Queen’s judge Justice Blair Nixon reversed the panel ruling and concluded that the panel did not consider relevant evidence about incidents of drug or alcohol abuse which involved both union and non union workers.

In the ruling for Suncor Energy which allows random drug testing Justice Nixon wrote that “The majority ignored evidence pertaining to some two-thirds of the individuals working in the oilsands operation. By focusing only on the bargaining unit, the majority (of the panel) expressly excluded consideration of relevant evidence.” The judge determined that a new arbitration panel was needed, and the new panel should thoroughly review the random testing plan submitted by the oil company. Sneh Seetal, the Suncor Energy spokesperson, defended the goal of the random testing plan and said that the company is pleased with the ruling by the judge. Seetal stated “What is important for Suncor is really looking at the driver behind our desire to include random testing in our already comprehensive safety program. We wouldn’t be pursuing this if we didn’t feel it was absolutely necessary.” According to Dave Moffat, the spokesman for Unifor, “We are disappointed but we will proceed through the system and hope for a satisfactory result. It is important to all Canadians that the randomness of this kind of personal invasion is something that we have to make sure gets vetted through our system and that everybody understands its seriousness and its implications.”