To date, British Columbia is the only Canadian province that has developed policies specifically addressing workplace bullying. What are a BC employer’s duties when it comes to this area of employee health and safety and how can they meet them? KEL’s Fiona McFarlane recently spoke to SHRM Online’s Catherine Skrzypinski about workplace investigations and employer […]
Archive | Blog
Workplace Bullying and Harassment: What To Do if it Happens to You
By Erin Brandt. In November 2013, WorkSafeBC implemented new policies that address bullying and harassment in the workplace. These policies define bullying and harassment as: Including any inappropriate conduct or comment by a person towards a worker that the person knew or reasonably ought to have known would cause that worker to be humiliated or […]
Mental Health Protections for Employees are Good for Business – and They’re Also the Law!
By Richard Johnson. In its 2017 decision in Saadati v. Moorhead, the Supreme Court of Canada affirmed that mental health is essential to our society and its workers. In recent years, we have summarized on our blog several court decisions that reflect these principles, where a judge has granted additional damages to an employee who […]
BC’s 14 Protected Grounds of Discrimination
By David Brown. Employers are prohibited from discriminating against employees at any time in the employment process. What is discrimination and what grounds are protected under British Columbia’s human rights legislation? Lawyer David Brown explains in his latest blog post here.
Valle Torres: Revisiting Key Principles for Calculating Damages
By Erin Brandt. We have written previously about how severance pay will generally be calculated if an employee is dismissed from work, and the need to treat an employee fairly in the manner of dismissal. (In case you missed them, we’ve included links to these articles at the end of this post.) Another recent BC […]
Can – and Should – Employers “Ban” After-Hours Work Email?
(First published May 2014. Updated June 2019.) Do you expect your employees to read and respond to work-related email after hours or on weekends? Or do you encourage your staff to “disconnect” once they leave the office? Some countries, like France, adopted laws that grants employees the legal right to ignore work emails outside of […]
5 Questions to Consider When Exploring the Duty to Accommodate
By David Brown. An employer’s duty to accommodate under human rights law and the concept of “undue hardship” are complicated legal issues which impose high obligations on business owners. Improper management of a human rights issue or jumping too quickly to an undue hardship claim can result in a complaint to a human rights commission […]
The Bikini Bistro and Discrimination in the Restaurant Industry
By David Brown. A new restaurant will be opening in Kamloops, BC, with a ‘unique’ dress code. As the name suggests, the Teenie Bikini Bistro will serve typical pub-style fare served by – wait for it – bikini girls. In today’s day-in-age, how is this still a thing? And how does this pass the smell test for […]
For the Good of the Force: Erin quoted in Global News Exclusive on RCMP (May 2019)
In a May 2019 exclusive, Global News reporter Jane Gerster revealed her findings of an alleged RCMP campaign to dismiss members with disabilities. Ms. Gerster spoke with various officers affected, as well as several lawyers with special expertise in the areas of human rights and workplace accommodations. One of these legal experts was KEL’s Erin […]
Calculating Severance: What Do the Courts Say?
By David Brown. While the creation and destruction of jobs is essential to our economy and workplaces, people affected by job loss are nonetheless dealing with a particular form of personal tragedy. After all, a job is not only a source of income; ideally, it contributes to our overall well-being and is an important part […]
