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Serious insight for serious situations.

Serious insight for serious situations.

Insights

Reflections and news direct from Rubin Thomlinson.
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Employers cannot withhold pay from an employee without authorization

In response to an employee’s mistake or failure to perform one or more of his or her regular duties, employers may be inclined to withhold that employee’s wages.  However, this is generally prohibited under the Ontario Employment Standards Act, 2000 (the “ESA”). I have seen this issue arise where an employer attempts to incentivize an

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No more clarity on family status

A recent decision of the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO) has created further confusion on the duty to accommodate as it relates to discrimination on the basis of family status. Family Status – A (brief) History Historically, there have been multiple (and conflicting) lines of cases on the test to be applied in cases

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Human rights: 25 Years in review

Some months ago, I was asked to speak at the Human Resources Professional Association’s HR Law Conference to be held in Toronto on October 20, 2016. My task was to identify the notable developments in workplace human rights over the last 25 years. This was no mean feat. There were so many cases to consider.

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“You’ll never believe what these people did at work.”

Courts and Tribunals have increasingly found in many instances that harassment “need not occur in the physical workplace to find that it occurred ‘in the workplace’”. To be the workplace, legal decision makers have focused on whether there is a nexus between the activity or the location and work. This is an interesting question of

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Workplace Investigations in the Federal Government: Is there an app for that?

Did you know that the Canadian Federal Government is our nation’s biggest employer? The Government of Canada signs the bi-weekly paycheque for upwards of 250,000 people in the core public administration and separate agencies.[1] All of these employees, plus roughly 100,000 National Defence and RCMP members and employees, look to the Treasury Board for their

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What we know and what we don’t know about the RCMP sexual harassment class action Settlement

Yesterday, in a much publicized press conference, the RCMP and the federal government announced that they had reached an agreement to settle a class action law suit in which some 500 current and former female RCMP employees claimed that they had been sexually harassed on the job. The agreement is subject to Federal Court approval,

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150 Words

As I think about what Canada’s 150th birthday means to me, I think about what it means to be Canadian and what I hope for the future of rights and freedoms in Canada and for Canadians. The words of former Prime Minister John Diefenbaker from 56 years ago still resonate. “I am a Canadian, free

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When one bad apple becomes a bushel: Changing workplace culture

Introduction Over the last few years, our workplace investigation practice has expanded to include a growing number of workplace assessments. Unlike investigations which focus on findings of fact, assessments take the cultural temperature of an organization or a work group within the organization. In contrast to investigations, which are generally triggered by a complaint, an

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