Blog
The recent Supreme Court of Canada judgment in the class-action suit filed against Saint Lawrence Cement / Ciment Saint-Laurent by the neighbouring residents of one of the company’s facilities near Quebec City clearly demonstrates the need for systematic stakeholder engagement. Although building and maintaining good relationships with one’s surrounding community already made business sense, it’s now imperative because stakeholders have legal recourse for social and environmental impacts not adequately addressed and that may have arisen despite regulatory compliance. This case sets new precedent: Communities need only to demonstrate abnormal nuisance or annoyance that exceeded reasonable levels of tolerance. Proving fault or wrongdoing is no longer critical.
Had appropriate processes been put in place at Saint Lawrence Cement to identify stakeholder concerns and expectations, and had multi-stakeholder partnerships been built around developing and implementing solutions of mutual acceptance and gain, the path to litigation would have never been paved. Dedicating resources to community relations and adopting appropriate engagement mechanisms would have cost the company little compared to the long legal battle, its resulting $15 M CAD judgement, and the uncalculated loss of reputation value.
Had appropriate processes been put in place at Saint Lawrence Cement to identify stakeholder concerns and expectations, and had multi-stakeholder partnerships been built around developing and implementing solutions of mutual acceptance and gain, the path to litigation would have never been paved. Dedicating resources to community relations and adopting appropriate engagement mechanisms would have cost the company little compared to the long legal battle, its resulting $15 M CAD judgement, and the uncalculated loss of reputation value.