Heller v. Uber and Procedural Arbitrability

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2020

Source Publication

Janet Walker, 'Heller v. Uber and Procedural Arbitrability', (2020), 86, Arbitration: The International Journal of Arbitration, Mediation and Dispute Management, Issue 4, pp. 503-516, https://doi.org/10.54648/amdm2020039

Keywords

arbitrability; competence-competence; Model Law; New York Convention; class actions; employment; consumer; validity of arbitral agreements

Abstract

In Heller v. Uber, the Supreme Court of Canada marked another milestone in its jurisprudence on competence-competence. By deciding that the inclusion of an arbitration clause in the Uber drivers’ agreement did not oblige a court to refer to an arbitral tribunal the jurisdictional question of whether the driver was an employee for purposes of the Employment Standards Act, the Court demonstrated a mature arbitration-friendly approach that will support the legitimacy of international commercial arbitration even as the Court marked the limits of competence-competence. Although the reasoning may have benefited from the application of the principle of arbitrability, and may have developed this principle by describing the question as one of ‘procedural arbitrability’, but the decision stands as a strong precedent for judicial reasoning on the relationship between the courts and arbitral tribunals.

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