An Ottawa public servant who slapped his boss has been given both his job back, and a $25,000 award for damages to his human rights.



According to a Public Service Labour Relations and Employment Board ruling, the government discriminated against Transport Canada engineer Naim Rahmani by ignoring evidence that his violence was related to a mental health problem — evidence first presented six months after the slap.



The slap occurred on the morning of Feb. 10, 2012.



Rahmani had a strained relationship with another engineer, Patrick Desbiens, and in 2009 had requested either a transfer or unpaid leave. Both were refused.



In the next three years, Rahmani took several sick leaves, backed by medical certificates.



In February 2012, he had just returned to work after a three-week sick leave when he got word that Desbiens had been appointed manager of his team.



Rahmani took the news badly, and went to Desbiens’s office.



Desbiens asked him twice to leave. When he didn’t, Desbiens stood up and turned toward Rahmani, who slapped his face, knocking his glasses to the floor.



Desbiens fled the office to a security desk, with Rahmani behind him.



Rahmani told an internal investigation that he pushed Desbiens back into his chair in a “defensive move” and followed him out of the office to ensure he didn’t exaggerate what happened.



In August 2012, Rahmani’s union representative gave management a medical certificate that suggested a health condition or related medication might explain the violence.



And in early 2013, a government medical officer concluded that Rahmani was unfit to work because of an unnamed mental health condition.



In April, however, Transport Canada fired him.



Rahmani grieved the termination, arguing it was an excessive punishment that ignored his mental health condition.



His family physician, Dr. Stanislaw Maziarz, told the labour relations board that “someone who has such a specialized profession, earns an excellent salary, and is head of a family does not slap his supervisor without a psychiatric explanation behind it.”



Government lawyer Michel Girard, however, argued that no medical evidence could justify an act of physical violence, and that all federal employees are subject to the same rules about violence in the workplace.



But the labour relations board flatly rejected those ideas.



The employer was “obligated to consider the situation’s medical aspect, which it did not,” said board member Marie-Claire Perrault.



Perrault said the government should have considered Rahmani’s work record, unblemished discipline file, the spontaneous nature of the act, and “a certain provocation” that led to the slap.



When those factors are taken into account, she said, Rahmani deserved to be suspended, not fired.



In its ruling, the labour relations board called Transport Canada’s attitude toward Rahmani’s use of sick leave “disconcerting,” and said it was indicative of a persistent refusal to acknowledge an employee’s legitimate health problems.



Perrault ordered the government to immediately reinstate Rahmani and restore lost seniority and pension benefits. She also awarded him $25,000 in damages under terms of the Canadian Human Rights Act.