Who Is Required to Have a Workplace Health and Safety Policy? As per the Occupational Health and Safety Act, in Ontario, most employers must create and then review a written workplace health and safety policy once a year. Specifically, employers with six or more workers must create a written health and safety policy. Employers with five or fewer …
Health and Safety
In Ontario, five workplace policies are required for most employers. While most employers are lawfully required to have these five HR policies in place, they can create them themselves. There is no need to get a lawyer or other third-party HR consultant to create them. However, a good lawyer or another HR expert can help …
It is clear that workers are starting to get “Zoom fatigue” and that experts agree that one treatment for this condition is switching off the camera. Even still, some employers still force their employees to leave the camera on for all Zoom meetings regardless of importance. Thus, a legal issue arises. Can employers do that? Can an …
Updated: July 30, 2020 Ontario Employers are responsible for protecting the health and safety of employees at work. They are required to take all reasonable measures to ensure employees are not exposed to the COVID-19 virus. What duties does an employer have (COVID-19)? The Occupational Health and Safety Act (“OHSA”) has specific duties for employers …
When is an employer’s duty to conduct a workplace investigation triggered? Generally, whenever there is a complaint of violence, harassment or sexual harassment in the workplace, an employer must conduct a workplace investigation. Note – this article will not discuss the scope or requirements of any workplace investigation. Rather, this article will simply discuss when …
Is Drinking at Work Just Cause for Termination? Employees can be terminated at any time for any reason so long as the employer provides notice. However, in certain situations employers can terminate employees without notice if they have “just cause” to terminate the employee. Thus, the question becomes, does drinking at work constitute “just cause”? …
Can Ministry of Labour Inspectors or Officers (i.e. lay-people) offer opinion evidence? Brief Answer: Yes (probably). Introduction: In R. v. Graat, the Supreme Court of Canada, for the first time, permitted an exception to the long-standing rule that lay-witnesses were excluded from providing opinion evidence. In that case, a police officer was able to opine …
In an Occupational Health and Act (“OHSA”) prosecution, the best defense is “due diligence”. In that regard, courts have held that discipline can be an element of due diligence. However, whether the discipline was reasonable enough to avoid the offense turns on whether it was “proportionate” and “effective” under the circumstances. This blog post discusses those two concerns: (A) …