Nicholls v. Central City Brewers and Distillers Ltd., 2026 BCHRT 44
Date Issued: February 5, 2026 File: CS-009249
Indexed as: Nicholls v. Central City Brewers and Distillers Ltd., 2026 BCHRT 44
IN THE MATTER OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS CODE
R.S.B.C. 1996, c. 210 (as amended)
AND IN THE MATTER of a complaint before
the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal
BETWEEN:
Darrienne (Taylor) Nicholls
COMPLAINANT
AND:
Central City Brewers and Distillers Ltd.
RESPONDENT
REASONS FOR DECISION
TIMELINESS OF COMPLAINT
Section 22
Tribunal Member: Steven Adamson
Counsel for the Complainant: Stephen Gillman
Counsel for the Respondent: Harvey Delaney
I Introduction
[1] On March 30, 2023, Darrienne Nicholls filed a complaint of discrimination in employment based on race, colour and ancestry contrary to s. 13 of the Human Rights Code [Code], against Central City Brewers and Distillers Ltd. [the Employer].
[2] The issue before me with respect to timeliness is whether to accept the complaint against the Employer. I make no findings regarding the merits of this complaint.
[3] The Employer reports that it entered into creditor protection in 2024 and a stay of actions was issued by the Court extending until April 2025. In February 2025 the Employer submits that a residual company assumed its retained liabilities, including Ms. Nicholls’ complaint. As such, the Employer argues Ms. Nicholls is precluded from continuing her complaint against them. Given my decision not to allow this complaint to proceed for reasons related to its timeliness, I did not find it necessary to decide the complicated issue of whether Ms. Nicholls can continue her complaint against the Employer in light of the creditors arrangements process that occurred.
[4] The Tribunal’s March 11, 2025, notice of complaint proceeding gave the parties an opportunity to make time limits submissions. While the Employer provided Form 4 – Time Limit Response submissions, to date Ms. Nicholls has not provided any Form 5 – Time Limit Reply submissions. From my review of the complaint file, I am satisfied that Ms. Nicholls’ counsel received the submissions schedule and the Employer’s Response submission. On July 25, 2025, the Tribunal reminded the parties that no Form 5 – Time Limit Reply was received and informed Ms. Nicholls’ counsel that he would need to provide late filing reasons if he intended to file one. I, therefore, proceed to make this time limits decision based on the information found in Ms. Nicholls’ complaint form information and the Respondent’s Form 4 – Time Limit Response.
[5] For the reasons that follow, I find that this complaint is not a continuing contravention of the Code. Further, it is not in the public interest to accept the late filed complaint.
II Background to complaint
[6] Ms. Nicholls is Black and identifies as Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Canadian.
[7] Determining whether Ms. Nicholls’ allegations are timely arguable contraventions of the Code requires me to set them out in some detail below.
[8] In late 2017, Ms. Nicholls started working part-time for the Employer. In early 2020 she was promoted to a full-time position and in June 2020 she was further promoted to a supervisory position.
[9] Shortly after her promotion to supervisor in June 2020, Ms. Nicholls alleges her supervisor, Ms. B, made inappropriate comments about her interest in applying for a government grant available to minorities wanting to start up a winery. Ms. B allegedly told Ms. Nicholls that she believed such a program was unfair because it was only available to Ms. Nicholls because she was a minority and “everyone should be treated equally”.
[10] In March 2021, Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B and Ms. W (who was Ms. B’s superior) discussed the issue of preferring medical practitioners of a similar race. Ms. Nicholls alleges that when she told her supervisors that she preferred to be treated by a doctor of African dissent, Ms. B accused her of being prejudiced against white doctors. Ms. Nicholls alleges that Ms. W failed to intervene to address the inappropriateness of Ms. B’s comments.
[11] On March 24, 2021, Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B posted a public social media comment condemning Ms. Nicholls’ previous post about the mistreatment of a Black person. Ms. Nicholls alleges that by this time Ms. B’s behaviour was significantly impacting her mental health.
[12] On September 24, 2021, Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B summoned her to meeting to discuss whether it was appropriate for Caucasian women to wear box-braids. Ms. Nicholls states that despite being shocked at the inappropriateness of the question, she replied that it was her belief that doing so amounted to cultural appropriation. Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B was not satisfied with her answer and proceeded to tell her that she had made the argument successfully with another “black person” earlier in the day. Ms. Nicholls alleges reporting this incident to Ms. W who suggested it was Ms. Nicholls who had possibly provoked the situation. Ms. W then allegedly told Ms. Nicholls she would speak to Ms. B about the matter. Later in the date, Ms. Nicholls alleges that Ms. B texted her to apologize about her questions and told her she would not speak about it again.
[13] On October 4, 2021, Ms. Nicholls went off work on an unpaid leave of absence for reasons related to mental disability associated with working with Ms. B. Ms. Nicholls alleges the Employer knew the reason for her absence was related to Ms. B’s conduct.
[14] On February 11, 2022, Ms. Nicholls alleges posting a picture of a sesame street character with box-braids on her social media account with a caption about adults needing to absorb the same information about cultural appropriation that was being successfully taught to children in this program. The next day, Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B responded with a post contradicting her about Caucasian people appropriating Black culture by wearing this hair style. To emphasize her point, Ms. Nicholls alleges Ms. B stated, “Why the fuss over a white woman having a black hairstyle?”. Ms. Nicholls alleges reporting the incident to Ms. W, who did not take any corrective action.
[15] Sometime later, Ms. Nicholls alleges reporting Ms. W’s failure to act to Employer’s human resources department. She alleges the director of the Employer’s human resources [the Director] promised to investigate the matter and speak to witnesses the week of April 16, 2022. Ms. Nicholls alleges the Director failed to interview her or seek her version of events during his investigation [the Investigation Process Allegation].
[16] On April 27, 2022, Ms. Nicholls alleges that the Director advised her that his investigation concluded Ms. B had not engaged in any wrongdoing, including discrimination. He went on further to inform Ms. Nicholls that her leave was not supported by medical evidence and threatened to terminate her if nothing was supplied or she failed to return to work [the Investigation Findings Allegation].
[17] It does not appear from the information on file that Ms. Nicholls returned to her position with the Employer. It is unclear whether she resigned or was terminated by the Employer.
III ANALYSIS AND DECISION
[18] The time limit set out in s. 22 of the Code is a substantive provision which is intended to ensure that complainants pursue their human rights remedies diligently: Chartier v. School District No. 62, 2003 BCHRT 39.
A. Time Limit and Arguable Contraventions
[19] The complaint was filed on March 30, 2023. To comply with the one-year time limit under s. 22(1) of the Code, the alleged act of discrimination had to occur on or after March 30, 2022.
[20] A complaint is filed in time if the last allegation of discrimination happened within one year, and older allegations are part of a “continuing contravention”: Code, s. 22(2); School District v. Parent obo the Child, 2018 BCCA 136 at para. 68 [School District].
[21] I start by considering whether Ms. Nicholls set out any timely allegations that are arguable contraventions of the Code capable of tethering the other late filed allegations as part of a continuing contravention. For an allegation to arguably be discrimination under the Code, Ms. Nicholls must show, if proven, that she has various personal characteristics (in this case race, colour and ancestry), experienced an adverse impact with respect to her employment, and that her personal characteristics were factors in the alleged adverse impacts for these timely allegations: Moore v. British Columbia (Education) [Moore], 2012 SCC 61 at para 33.
[22] From my review of the complaint information, there are two timely allegations for consideration as to whether they are arguable contraventions of the Code. The first is the April 16, 2022, Investigation Process Allegation and the second is the April 27, 2022, Investigation Findings Allegation. All the other allegations in this case were late filed should there be no timely arguable contraventions. In reaching this conclusion, I acknowledge that Ms. Nicholls believes that her complaint was file in time with the latest event occurring at the time of the Investigation Process Allegation on April 27, 2022. She asserts that all the conduct in question is similar or related because each event was about inappropriate and discriminatory comments made about her by co-workers. I note, however, that Ms. Nicholls’ complaint information does not provide any detailed analysis concerning how the two investigation allegations satisfy the Moore requirements.
[23] Starting with the Investigation Process Allegation, I am satisfied that this allegation meets the Moore requirements in that Ms. Nicholls has the personal characteristics of being Black, Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Canadian. She also suffered an arguable adverse impact in not being interviewed as part of the Employer’s investigation in her discrimination complaint about Ms. B’s conduct and Ms. W’s failure to act. However, in my view there is nothing to indicate the Investigation Process Allegation is related to Ms. Nicholls’ personal characteristics, such as race, colour and ancestry. In my view, the inadequacy of the investigation on its own does not indicate a relationship to Ms. Nicholls’ personal characteristics. Simply stated, there is a lack of information linking the failure to interview her for reasons related to her race, colour and ancestry. As such, the Investigation Process Allegation will not proceed as an arguable contravention.
[24] For similar reasons, I find the Investigation Findings Allegation is not an arguable contravention of the Code. Ms. Nicholls has satisfied the Moore requirements of having protected personal characteristics and clearly suffered an adverse impact in the Employer’s finding of no discrimination following its investigation. However, with respect to this allegation I agree with the Employer that the conclusion of an investigation with a negative outcome for the employee on its own is not necessarily an arguable contravention of the Code. In this case, investigation findings are not automatically related to Ms. Nicholls’ personal characteristics, including her race, colour and ancestry, simply because they were not found in her favour. In these circumstances, the Investigation Findings Allegation will not proceed as an arguable contravention.
[25] With reference to Ms. Nicholls’ multiple allegations from mid 2020 until February 22, 2022, I have also reviewed them to determine whether they meet the Moore requirements for arguable contraventions. I have decided these other allegations are all arguable contraventions since they contain the necessary relationship between the alleged harms and Ms. Nicholls’ race, colour and ancestry. For example, it is clear that the adverse impact Ms. Nicholls experienced in being harassed by Ms. B about her social media post about cultural appropriation in February 2022 is related to her race, colour and ancestry. Here, Ms. B’s criticism of Ms. Nicholls’ post about cultural appropriate of Black hairstyles is clearly related to Ms. Nicholls being Black. Similar conclusions about relatedness apply to the other allegations from mid June 2020 until this one in mid February 2022.
[26] Having concluded the Complaint does not contain any timely allegations capable of forming a continuing contravention of the Code and was late filed for multiple allegations from mid 2020 until mid February 2022, it is necessary to determine whether it is in the public interest to accept the late-filed complaint against the Respondents and whether there would be any substantial prejudice.
B. Public Interest
[27] Whether it is in the public interest to accept the late-filed complaint is a multi-faceted analysis. The enquiry is fact and context specific and assessed in accordance with the purposes of the Code: Hoang v. Warnaco and Johns, 2007 BCHRT 24 at para. 26. The Tribunal considers a non-exhaustive list of factors, including the length of the delay, the reasons for the delay, and the public interest in the complaint itself: British Columbia (Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General) v. Mzite, 2014 BCCA 220 [Mzite] at para. 53. These are important factors, but they are not necessarily determinative: Goddard v. Dixon, 2012 BCSC 161 at para. 152; Mzite at para. 55.
[28] I have first considered the length of delay in filing. The allegations of discrimination in this case range from mid-2020 until mid-February 2022. In its most favourable to Ms. Nicholls, the complaint was, therefore, less than two months late filed, which is a significant delay, but may not be inordinate or beyond consideration, if other factors militate in favour of acceptance: Young v. Home Depot and others, 2018 BCHRT 68 at para. 42.
[29] As noted above, Ms. Nicholls did not believe her complaint was late filed and did not provide any late filing reasons. When the Tribunal notified her that this was a live issue, she did not provide any submissions.
[30] Having the concluded Ms. Nicholls’ complaint was late filed without receiving any submissions setting out her reasons for late filing, I do not find that it is in the public interest to accept the late-filed complaint, and I need not address the issue of whether substantial prejudice would result.
IV Conclusion
[31] For these reasons, the complaint is not a continuing contravention of the Code, and it is not in the public interest to accept it late filed.
Steven Adamson
Tribunal Member