A few weeks ago I was invited to celebrate a friend’s birthday at this nightclub: www.centuryroom.com
Upon arriving, I was asked for ID, which I provided. The bouncer was about to let me in, but then took another look at the ID and said there is a problem. Apparently, despite being above the legal drinking age, I was below their arbitrary age (24 I believe) for entry. This was in no way a private club and the policy wasn’t even stated on their website. I eventually talked my way in which was a whole other story but the point is, I don’t think the nightclub’s policy is legal, because it violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Can anyone substantiate this? What about in the States, is there precident over there?
In the States, there would be no Constitutional Equal Protection violation, because there is no government action. Having certain age restrictions could possibly violate a local or federal law, but wouldn’t be unconstitutional if done by a purely private business. Those signs you sometimes see that say “We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone”? That refusal of service can be done for any reason and not be unconstitutional.
I’m not sure, but I think the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is found in the Constitution - if the Canadian Constitution is like the US’s, it applies (almost) strictly to governmental action. However, Canada may have passed laws similar to our Equal Rights laws, which could make certain discrimination illegal.
Also, the result may be different if the nightclub were government run, government funded, etc, which I’m assuming* it’s not. Not a complete answer, but maybe this’ll help.
–KidScruffy
But as we all know, when you’re assuming you’re making an ASS out of U and MING.
KidScruffy is correct; the Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies only to the government, not private institutions. Some(probably all, but I don’t know this for sure) provinces have human-rights legislation preventing private businesses from discriminating, but I don’t think that age is one of the criteria.
Agreement with the foregoing: it wouldn’t be the Charter - if anything it would be the provincial or federal Human Rights Act.
Unfortunately it seems they’re entitled to behave as they did, but if you insisted on going to the barricades over this, you might be able to do something with the fact that it wasn’t posted - if it was applied arbitrarily to you, in other words. IANAL, of course.
Since s/he did talk her/his way in, even that can’t really be actioned now.
There seems to be a remarkable amount of leeway for age discrimination; entire SUBDIVISIONS have bizarre, near-fascist rules about keeping small children out of the neighbourhood. A club seems like small potatoes next to that.
Full Story: Told bouncer I wanted to just find my friends and tell them the situation and promised he could hold onto my ID to ensure I only took 5 minutes. Found my friends, we discussed it and decided to stay put. Two hours later just before closing time I bribed a bartender to tell me who was in charge and how to find them, asked them to goto a backroom to discuss a serious problem, and they were very reasonable and accomodating, particuarly in light of the lack of mention on the website. The manager came outside with me, told the obviously irate (but polite in front of his boss) bouncer to give me my ID back and we were on our way. Actually because they didn’t expect me to have stayed, I saved the $20 cover
MikeS: So according to what you quoted re: recreational clubs, could golf clubs restrict access to women? or jews? like they did in the past.
General Question: Isn’t the Ontario Human Rights Code an unenforcable joke that a tiny powerless commission will occasional investigate complaints based upon?
If you are making a reference to the civil rights battles at lunch counters, then this dog won’t hunt. Certain types of discrimination (such as by race) are prohibited by law. It’s just that age descrimination isn’t one of them.
It looks like they could restrict access to women, but not Jews, since the “excluded classes” are “age, sex, marital status or family status”. It does seem strange, though.
The other question is whether the venue in question was in fact a “recreational club”. I would assume that your run-of-the-mill Tim Horton’s or Pizza Pizza doesn’t qualify as a “recreational club”, so they can’t discriminate on any of the bases listed in Section 1; but I don’t doubt that there’s a precise legal definition of the term with umpteen caveats & filigrees.
A club could probably discriminate on the basis of age (e.g. concerts don’t allow kids under 18) if it had a posted policy whoich made this clear and applied to everybody. Bouncers can, of course, be idiots and not let people into the club. But I think they would have a tough time, legally, discriminating on the basis of age if this policy was not posted or could not be shown to apply to everyone (i.e. if other people in the club were below 24). I’m no lawyer – bite your tongue – not that I’m advising you to do that.
