Court Opinion

ID: 9675091
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:41:53.183221+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:31.453978
License: Public Domain

L. M. Glazer, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part). I concur with parts i, hi, iv, and v of the majority opinion reversing the trial court’s grant of summary disposition.
With regard to part n, I respectfully dissent.
This Court has already held that a private right of action does exist, at least in equity. In Muskegon Building & Construction Trades v Muskegon Intermediate School Dist, 130 Mich App 420, 430; 343 NW2d 579 (1983), this Court held that the members of the plaintiff union had sufficient prop*449erty rights that the circuit court could grant the union an injunction against the defendant’s pending violation of the statute:
[P]laintiff alleges that it can prove that, as a result of defendant’s failure to comply with the prevailing wage act, its members were deprived of employment they would otherwise have enjoyed. Under these circumstances, the circuit court had equity jurisdiction to issue an injunction.
Moreover, Dudewicz v Norris-Schmid, Inc, 443 Mich 68; 503 NW2d 645 (1993), is a limited holding. In that case, an employee was fired for reporting to the police that he had been assaulted by a fellow employee. The trial court dismissed the plaintiff’s claim under the Whistleblowers’ Protection Act, MCL 15.361 et seq.] MSA 17.428(1) et seq., and also dismissed his alternative "public policy” tort claim.
The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the plaintiff did state a claim under the Whistleblowers’ Protection Act. This being the case, the Supreme Court went on to hold that where a plaintiff already has a remedy expressly conferred by statute, the Court will not recognize a tort claim based on "public policy.
In Forster v Delton School Dist, 176 Mich App 582, 585; 440 NW2d 421 (1989), this Court held:
The campaign financing act does not allow for enforcement by private individuals. MCL 169.215; MSA 4.1703(15) provides an express remedy to enforce the duties imposed under the campaign financing act. The campaign financing act also provides for criminal penalties for knowing violation of the act. . . .
. . . Since the act provides an adequate remedy to enforce its provisions, no private right of action can be inferred.
*450In both of the above-cited cases, the appellate court’s focus was not upon the existence of a statutorily created right, but, rather, the existence of an adequate remedy to enforce the statutory right.
In the present case, Cornwall alleges that a contractor (a) fraudulently induced a public entity to engage his company, (b) underbid his competitors by violating the law, (c) intimidated his employees against blowing the whistle while the project was under construction, and (d) finished the project before the Rochester Board of Education received any allegations of chicanery — thus precluding the Board of Education from timely invoking MCL 508.556; MSA 17.256(6).
If there is no right of action in this situation, then the intended beneficiaries of the statute — the workers — have no means of timely seeking court enforcement of their rights without being fired. If ever a statutory remedy was plainly inadequate, this one is.
Therefore, I would infer that where it is alleged that a contractor has prevented his employees from timely informing the other contracting party of violations, thus depriving them of their only statutory remedy, a private right of action for damages exists.