Author: robertsonlaw

In Rahman v. Cannon Design Architecture Ltd., the court upheld a termination provision by distinguishing appellate court authority which would otherwise have bound the Court to void the provision for denying ESA minimum payments entitling Ms. Rahman to common-law notice.  With respect to the Court, this was unnecessary.  The Court was...

Many employees in Toronto receive commissions and bonus.  In the recent case of Kraft v. Firepower Financial Corp., the Court awarded an exceptional commission for a sale crystallizing post-termination during the notice period but used an average of bonus pool compensation in the two years pre-termination to determine pay in lieu of notice.  If...

If the employer has no work for such employee(s) why would they expect to be able to demonstrate on a balance of probabilities that their competitors do?  Remember, an employee need only seek comparable employment during the period of reasonable notice claimed within a relatively tight geographic scope.  This employer strategy, absent compelling...

The provincial government has extended Infectious Disease Emergency Leave (“IDEL”) (now until September 25, 2021). This pushes the deemed termination of employees under the ESA back to year-end 2021 at the earliest. Merry Christmas…Ontario Courts recently released competing decisions regarding employee rights to commence claims of constructive...

I’ve written before about why employers have kicked the can of workplace restructure down the road using Infectious Disease Emergency Leave (“IDEL”) hint: because they could without incurring termination cost.When IDEL expires (currently in July but will the government extend the leave period?) what happens?  Well, the answer is remarkably...

An Alberta Court has awarded 9 months notice to an engineer with 6 years of service at the time his compensation was unilaterally reduced by 20%. There are many workplaces in Ontario which have imposed similar unilateral pay reductions or imposed significantly increased duties upon employees without additional compensation.  Navigating...

Many employers have availed themselves of the legislation enacted in Ontario creating Infectious Disease Emergency Leave. The result has been that many employers have been able to kick the can of workforce restructure down the road for a year or longer with little or no wage payment to their employees.  As employers consider reopening during a...

The Ontario Court of Appeal has confirmed the law of constructive dismissal in Ontario.  Employees are constructively dismissed when the employer breaches an essential term of the employment contract OR a course of conduct by the employer establishes that it no longer intends to be bound by the employment contract. It’s this second branch of the...

We’re back!  We are pleased to announce that Christopher Robertson Law PC is leaving Morrison Brown Sosnovitch LLP effective January 1, 2021.  Christopher Robertson Law PC is a firm that provides practical solutions to employers and employees and effective court room advocacy when necessary.  Smart, measured, and efficient legal...

In a recent decision, the Ontario Court of Appeal confirmed what a few employment counsel had been saying all along.  The standard for withholding statutory payments is wilful misconduct.  This is a higher threshold than cause at common-law.  Employment agreements that reference cause in the termination sections are largely unenforceable because they provide a lesser right than...