The Supreme Court of Canada issued an interesting decision recently in the area of contract law. It began by stating: “Canadian common law in relation to good faith performance of contracts is piecemeal, unsettled and unclear.” Clearly, this was an unsatisfactory state of affairs that the Court was … [Read more...]
Bench Press 39-3: Seven Seconds: $27 Million
A Quebec man had his hopes and his fortune dashed when the Supreme Court of Canada decided recently to dismiss his application for leave to appeal a decision of the Quebec Court of Appeal. Joel Ifergan scooted into a convenience store just before 9 pm in 2008 and bought two lottery tickets for that … [Read more...]
Bench Press 39-3: Tragic Tale of Two Girls
Two young aboriginal girls both had been diagnosed with the same type of aggressive cancer and both were receiving chemotherapy for their illness. In both cases, their mothers decided to withdraw their children from conventional cancer treatment and pursue aboriginal healing methods. In one case, … [Read more...]
CPLEA Launches Willownet.ca
Last year at this time the Centre for Public Legal Education Alberta (CPLEA) published an issue of LawNow titled When It Hurts to Be Home addressing the theme of abuse and the law. The Centre for Public Legal Education (CPLEA) has a long history of providing accessible legal information in plain … [Read more...]
The Duty of Unions to Fairly Represent Their Members
Introduction About one-third of all Canadian workers, and most public sector employees, are members of unions, sometimes by choice and sometimes by legislation. Unions offer greater collective power than an individual generally can marshal for the negotiation and administration of collective … [Read more...]
Law in the Public Interest
In this issue of LawNow, the Special Report focuses on Public Interest Standing in courts and other tribunals. That got me thinking about public interest law in general. The Career Development Office of the University of Toronto says: Public interest or social justice law has been described as … [Read more...]
Issues Faced by Vulnerable Workers in Canada
The Law Commission of Ontario defines vulnerable workers as “those engaged in precarious work”. “Precarious work” includes: those jobs where one has low wages and at least two of these other features; no pension; no union; and/or small firm size. Precarious work includes temporary … [Read more...]
The Right to Refuse Dangerous Work
There may, undoubtedly, be cases justifying a wilful disobedience of such an order; as where the servant apprehends danger to her life, or violence to her person, from the master; or where, from an infectious disorder raging in the house, she must go out for the preservation of her life. But the … [Read more...]
Workplace Bullying: What Employers Need to Know
Bullying in the workplace is slightly different from bullying seen in the childhood sandbox. There is rarely physical violence or threats (although these are possible), and the tormentors may not always be the most obvious culprits. Instead, workplace bullying may not even be noticeable to an … [Read more...]
Being Fired: Employment and Identity
Clearing Your Name: Some Basic Rules if You’ve Been Fired for Fraud You’ve just been fired. It’s probably affecting you financially and emotionally to a great degree. Worse yet, your (now former) employer is saying it is “for cause” or “just cause”, possibly because of as serious an accusation as … [Read more...]
