Two ambulance attendants have been compensated $7,500 each for being prevented from eating their non-kosher lunches in a kosher cafe at the Montreal Jewish General Hospital.

In February 2005, Yvon Verreault and Ginette Gelasko brought a patient to the hospital and then decided to eat their brown-bag lunch at the hospital's cafe. They were asked by the restaurant's manager to eat their non-kosher lunch elsewhere.

After they refused, a security guard asked them to leave.

"I am happy that we've settled the matter to the satisfaction of everyone," said hospital executive director Henri Elbaz.

However, Elbaz said the problem was not their non-kosher food but that they were eating their lunch in a restaurant where food was being sold.

"It was like bringing your lunch to McDonalds," he said.

The pair made a complaint to the Quebec Human Rights Commission, which ruled the hospital did not reasonably accommodate them. After two years of negotiations, the hospital and the ambulance attendants reached an agreement to settle the dispute.