We have talked a lot about workplace sexual harassment on this blog. Practising exclusively in workplace law we, unfortunately, see the issue of workplace sexual harassment come up a lot. Helping employers and employees of all shapes and sizes deal with issues related to sexual harassment makes up a lot of what we do. Employer … Continue Reading
You may be scratching your head at our title. What’s ergonomics got to do with law? Maybe even asking, what the heck is ergonomics? Well in this post we will answer both of those questions and tell you why workplace ergonomics should be on the radar of employees and employers alike. Ergonomics is the science … Continue Reading
Technology continues to blur the lines between our personal and work lives. How often have you answered a client email on your work laptop, only to receive a follow-up question via text message on your personal phone? Many workplaces have adapted to the fluid use of technology and encourage their employees to use their … Continue Reading
Valentine’s Day has us thinking about romance. In the mind of an employment lawyer, the leap from romance to harassment is a short one, and so that is what our post is about today. Harassment is not a new topic for us. You can read our past posts on sexual harassment, employer obligations regarding harassment … Continue Reading
Happy Boxing Day everyone! Holidays and vacations are interesting topics for us employment lawyers. We have blogged about Public Holidays under the Ontario Employment Standards Act, 2000 (“ESA”) and in the past. Check out our posts on this topic here. For workplaces in Ontario, governed by provincial law, there are nine Public Holidays. These are: … Continue Reading
Pre-employment police record checks have become common in our information-obsessed society. This is where the employer requires a job candidate to pass a police record check as a condition of being hired. The Police Record Checks Reform Act (the “Act”) was designed to standardize why and when these record checks can be obtained, as opposed … Continue Reading
Bill 47, the Ford government’s Making Ontario Open for Business Act has passed. One big change the bill makes is to the much discussed (and much used) Bill 148 amendment regarding Personal Emergency Leave. This amendment will come into force on January 1, 2019. For historical purposes, you can read all about the Bill 148 … Continue Reading
Earlier this year the federal government amended the Holidays Act to include Remembrance Day as a legal holiday. You can read more about this in our past post Remembrance Day Enacted as a Legal Holiday. In Ontario, Remembrance Day has not been added to the Employment Standards Act as a public holiday and consequently, workers … Continue Reading
Last week the Ford government tabled Bill 47, Making Ontario Open for Business Act, 2018. This legislation would repeal many of the amendments made by the Bill 148, Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act, 2017, most of which came into force in January 2018 but some of which are slated for January 2019. Not surprisingly the … Continue Reading
Pot has now been legal in Canada for one week! Hell has not frozen over, or broken loose, as far as we can tell. Legal marijuana has been reportedly selling out and even illegal dispensaries are apparently having trouble keeping up. This suggests an uptick in cannabis consumption. I guess some people really were deterred … Continue Reading
Legislatively speaking, a lot has happened in the Ontario workplace law space over the past year. The biggest shake-ups being the Bill 148 changes to the Employment Standards Act and today’s legalization of recreational cannabis. The state of workplace law continues to evolve as the Doug Ford government takes steps to undo the Liberal legislation. … Continue Reading
In our connected age, work often creeps beyond the set hours of the workday. See my last post about legislating the right to disconnect for more on this. We often get questions from employers and employees about whether salaried workers should be getting paid for these extra hours and what exactly counts as “overtime.” Let’s … Continue Reading
The right to disconnect has been in the news lately following the release of the federal government’s report on their year-long consultations about modernizing the federal Canada Labour Code. Have a look at the full report: What We Heard: Modernizing Federal Labour Standards. 93% of respondents stated that employees should have the right to refuse … Continue Reading
Technology has impacted our privacy in a myriad of ways. One crafty use of technology that we see more and more in workplace disputes, is employee made audio recordings. Employees are turning on their voice memo apps before they go into important meetings and covertly recording their conversations. While undeniably an audio recording is great … Continue Reading
Summer is almost over. I’m looking forward to kids going back to school and enjoying our last public holiday of the season. On the topic of public holidays; I’ve blogged aboutLabour Day in the past and we have followed along with the various changes (and reversals of those changes) made by Bill 148 to the … Continue Reading
Further to our post last week about key employees leaving, employers may wonder about risks to their business and options for recourse if that key employee leaves and sets up a competing shop next door. There are three main potential risks presented by a departing key employee: Misuse of employer confidential information Setting up a … Continue Reading
This post is a quick update to our past posts on the legalization of cannabis. You can see everything we have written about the legalization of cannabis and how to prepare your workplace here. More changes are afoot to Ontario’s planned rollout of recreational cannabis. The Doug Ford government has reversed the previous administration’s plan … Continue Reading
The Canadian government’s legalization of recreational cannabis has again lately been a hot news item. Initially, there were some reports that recreational cannabis was to be legalized this week, by July 1, 2018. For a variety of reasons that date has been pushed back. Legalization is now set for October 17, 2018. For more details … Continue Reading
I love technology and embrace the changes it brings to the workplace. One way we see a big shift is the rising popularity of remote working. Our firm, SpringLaw, is totally remote so perhaps I have a slight bias, but remote working has several advantages. Remote working can also present some challenges. Employers interested in … Continue Reading
Remembrance Day in the Spring? With long weekends on the horizon as summer finally rolls in, we turn our minds to the holiday that only some of us get off – Remembrance Day. Spring discussion of Remembrance is, in fact, timely. In March 208, a law amending the Holidays Act passed in the House of … Continue Reading
By now everyone should know that sexual harassment is not permissible in the workplace, but even amidst the flurry of allegations we have seen in the #metoo era, exactly what constitutes sexual harassment might still be a little fuzzy. With love in the air today, workers across the land might be wondering, can I ask … Continue Reading
Merry Christmas! Wait. What? Can we still say that in public? Why yes, we can, but not at the cost of excluding all other religions in the workplace. For those that do not celebrate Christian holidays (and/or secular commercial holidays derived from Christian traditions), focusing only on Christian traditions can feel like exclusion. It’s hard … Continue Reading
The Liberal government has introduced changes to the federal parental leave benefits program. Details of the changes were announced early November and are set to come into force on December 3, 2017. This change is separate from the various Bill 148 changes coming down the pipe. What’s New? These are not additional monetary benefits, but … Continue Reading
Bonus entitlement is always a juicy topic. In September the Ontario Superior Court of Justice released a decision that shed some light on the issue of how entitlement to a bonus will be treated where an employer has no formal bonus policy, but a consistent past practice. In Fulmer v. Nordstrong Equipment Limited, a wrongful … Continue Reading
