The clock that already ran: the complaint window
Under s.9, a complaint must be made within 3 months of the incident, extendable by a further 3 months where the Internal Committee is satisfied that circumstances prevented the complainant filing sooner. By the time a complaint is in front of the committee, this clock has already run its course. It's worth confirming — and recording — that the window was met, or properly extended with reasons noted, as the first entry in the file rather than an afterthought raised later.
Day zero to day 90: the inquiry
Under s.11, the inquiry must be completed within 90 days of the complaint being received. Inside that window, the practical sequence is: acknowledging the complaint, giving the respondent a copy, hearing both parties, examining evidence and any witnesses, and producing a written report with findings. Natural justice runs through all of it — both parties have to be heard, and have to see the case against them, before the committee finds anything.
Confidentiality through the inquiry
The identities of the complainant, the respondent, any witnesses, and the substance of the inquiry are to stay confidential throughout. In practice that means limiting who sees the file to the people actually running or party to it — not the wider office, and not anyone whose role in the matter has ended.
Day 90 to day 150: the employer acts
Under s.13, once the Internal Committee's report reaches the employer, the employer must act on it within 60 days. That covers acting on the findings and implementing whatever punitive or safeguard recommendations the report contains — it is the employer's obligation, distinct from the committee's own 90-day deadline that precedes it.
Where the timeline commonly slips
- Acknowledgment of the complaint is delayed, eating into the 90-day inquiry window before the inquiry itself has started.
- The committee doesn't schedule hearings on a fixed cadence, so days pass between sessions without anything moving forward.
- The external member seat is vacant or the appointed member is unavailable, and the inquiry proceeds — or stalls — without a validly constituted committee.
- The written report is drafted in a rush near day 90, rather than through the inquiry.
- The employer sits on the report past the 60-day action window, with no record of why.
Where employer-side case support fits, and the firewall
When a company needs help preparing its response, gathering documentation, or presenting management's position during an inquiry, that support has to sit clearly apart from the Internal Committee itself. An advocate advising the employer's side on a case cannot also be the external member sitting in judgment on that same case. We keep the two functions — advocates who sit as external members, and advocates who advise the employer's side — assigned to different individuals, disclosed upfront rather than discovered later. See the panel for who does which.