'They could be fired': Employees may need to show proof of vaccination as workplaces reopen
As Ontario inches toward its economic reopening and employers prepare to recall their workers, labour lawyers are warning that in some cases employees may need to be vaccinated to hold onto their jobs.
“Any employee working cheek-to-jowl with other employees could be ordered to be vaccinated,” employment lawyer Howard Levitt said Monday. “If they don’t, they could be fired.”
Levitt predicts that requiring employees who work alongside others to be fully immunized could be part of the province’s post-pandemic normal, given that employers are legally obligated to operate a safe workplace—and could face steep fines and other tough penalties if they don’t.
The main exceptions would be on medical or religious grounds, which Levitt says would have to be substantive and documented.
“There would have to be accommodations for such situations,” Lai-King Hum, founder of Hum Law Firm, told CTV Toronto on Monday.
“In some workplaces that may mean that those employees would have to work in an area where they are not in contact with other employers.”
But there is no legal requirement for employers to accommodate employees who refuse to be vaccinated by offering separate workspaces or work-from-home options, according to Levitt.
Quebec recently said that certain health care workers would need to be fully vaccinated, but a spokesperson for Ontario’s Ministry of Labour said Monday that the provincial government is not considering any vaccine mandates.
In the U.S., Saks is requiring immunization for workers heading back to head office, and the cast and crew of the broadway production Hamilton are also required to be vaccinated. Airlines like United and Delta have imposed vaccination criteria on new hires.
Labour lawyers say any vaccine requirement in Ontario workplaces could apply to staff who work alongside colleagues, and especially the public, but not to employees who work-from-home.
Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act does not directly address vaccination or the enforcement of employer vaccination policies for workers.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Canada's most wanted fugitive arrested in P.E.I. in connection with Toronto homicide
A suspect in a fatal shooting in Toronto’s east end last summer has been arrested in Charlottetown, just one week after he topped a list of Canada’s most wanted fugitives.
BREAKING Federal employees will be required to spend 3 days a week in the office
Starting in September, public servants in the core public administration will be required to work in the office a minimum of three days a week. The Treasury Board Secretariat says executives will need to be in the office four days per week.
Concerns about plexiglass prompt inspections at some Loblaws locations in Ottawa
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall plexiglass barriers.
OPP officer said 'someone's going to get hurt' before wrong-way Hwy. 401 crash
As multiple Durham police cruisers were chasing a robbery suspect on the wrong side of Highway 401 Monday night, an Ontario Provincial Police officer shared his concerns, telling a dispatcher, "Someone's going to get hurt."
Poilievre returns to House unrepentant for calling Trudeau 'wacko,' Speaker not resigning
An unrepentant Pierre Poilievre returned to the House of Commons on Wednesday to pepper the prime minister about his drug decriminalization policies after being booted the day prior for refusing to take back calling Justin Trudeau 'wacko' over his approach to the issue.
Five human skeletons, missing hands and feet, found outside house of Nazi leader Hermann Göring
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
Toddler of Phoenix first responder dies after bounce house goes airborne
A two-year-old child died after a strong gust of wind sent the bounce house he was in airborne and into a neighbouring lot in central Arizona, the Pinal County Sheriff's Office said.
Plane overshoots runway at airport in St. John's, N.L., no injuries reported
Investigators from the Transportation Safety Board of Canada are headed to St. John's, N.L., after a plane overshot a runway at the city's airport this afternoon.
A teen was found buried in a basement in New York. An engraved ring helped police learn her identity two decades later
For more than two decades, the unknown victim was nicknamed "Midtown Jane Doe" because she was found in the Hell's Kitchen neighbourhood of New York City. But this week, investigators finally revealed her identity.