May Is Lyme Disease Awareness Month
If your workers work outside, one of the safety hazards you may need to protect them from is the risk of being bitten by ticks and thus contracting Lyme disease. […]
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Ontario Bill 88 Increases OHS Penalties, Requires Naloxone Kits
The 4 things Ontario OHS coordinators must know about Bill 88. Newly passed Ontario employment legislation, Bill 88, aka, the Working for Workers Act, 2022, makes significant changes to the OHS […]
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Ontario Introduces Bill 88: Legislation Mandating Electronic Monitoring Policies And Workplace Naloxone Kits And Increasing Fines Under The OHSA
Bottom Line On February 28, 2022, the Ontario Legislature introduced Bill 88, Working for Workers Act, 2022. In addition to the enactment of the Digital Platform Workers Rights Act, 2022 (which will be analyzed […]
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Drugs & Alcohol: Black Worker Required to Acknowledge Safety-Sensitive Status Claims Racism
An oil worker claimed that his supervisor was racist and that Suncor demanded he sign a letter acknowledging that his position was safety-sensitive and thus subject to random drug testing, […]
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Drugs & Alcohol: Being Impaired at Work Is Just Cause to Fire Safety-Sensitive Railway Worker
A track operations foreman got fired after a post-incident test came back positive for cocaine. The union contended that the penalty was a gross over-reaction resulting from an unfair investigation. […]
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What Constitutes a “Disability” – Know the Laws of Your Province
Drug and alcohol dependency is a disability, casual use is not. While workers with substance abuse problems can create significant safety hazards, they may also be deemed to have a disability […]
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Is a Worker’s Failure to Disclose Medical Marijuana Use Grounds for Termination?
Don’t expect workers to self-disclose substance abuse if you don’t have a disclosure policy. There are nearly 300,000 legally registered medical marijuana users in Canada, nearly 8% of the population. Firing […]
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Workplace Drugs, Alcohol & Substance Abuse Compliance Game Plan
Preventing work impairment without violating privacy and disability accommodations laws. Workplace substance abuse shouldn’t be such a controversial issue. After all, you can’t keep workers safe unless they show up sober, […]
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What to Do When a Worker Shows Signs of Substance Abuse: Ask The Expert
The employer’s duty to inquire about a worker’s potential need for accommodations. QUESTION What are our legal responsibilities if we suspect that one of our employees has substance abuse issues? ANSWER Employees with drug […]
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Testing Policies at Work: Drugs, Alcohol & COVID-19
Recorded Date: February 2, 2022 Time: 9:00 AM – 10:30 AM PST Speaker: Preston Parsons Recording: To access the recording of this webinar, please go here. This session will look at the current state of […]
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OK to Fire Driver for Falsely Denying DUI Incident
A truck driver with a record of attendance, performance and attitude issues managed to hang onto her job. The beginning of the end came when she was pulled over for […]
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OK to Require Medical Exam of Marijuana User’s Fitness for Safety-Sensitive Job
An energy company required safety-sensitive workers to pass pre-assignment drug testing before letting them work at the refinery. The company learned that a journeyman electrician the union sent to the […]
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OK to Fire Safety-Sensitive Worker for Not Being Fit for Duty
A safety-sensitive tree utility worker got fired for flunking his drug test. The Nova Scotia labour standards officer found that there was no just cause to terminate, but the employer […]
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Potential Suicide Risks Grounds for Workers Comp Not to Pay for Medical Pot
Does workers comp have to pay for medical marijuana legally prescribed to treat a former prison guard’s work-related post-traumatic stress disordered? After ping-ponging around the workers comp appeals tribunals, a […]
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No Security Clearance for Employee Involved in Drug Trafficking Incident
During a 2016 traffic stop search, agents found a WestJet employee to be in possession of 164 grams of marijuana. The employee was charged with drug trafficking. And even though […]
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Ontario Case Draws New Line on Power of Arbitrator to Review Drug Testing Policies
Arbitrator declines union’s bid to overturn nuclear power plant testing policy based on federal regulations. Labour arbitration boards have served as the primary battlefield in the decades-long war between employers and […]
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Bar Owner Fined $50,000 for Customer’s Drunk Driving
Video camera footage clearly showed that the customer served 5 20-ounce beers in the course of an hour was already visibly drunk when he entered the bar. So, when the […]
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Firing Union Nurse for Alcohol Addiction Is a Labour, Not a Human Rights Case
A case that has drawn national attention has now gone all the way to the nation’s highest court. It began when a home care aide came to work drunk. She […]
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Scorecard of the Key Workplace Drugs & Alcohol Cases Decided Since Marijuana Legalization
Using actual court cases to evaluate whether your workplace testing policies are legally sound. It’s been 3 years since Canada officially legalized recreational cannabis on October 17, 2018. Of course, while […]
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How to Create a Legally Enforceable Workplace Drugs & Alcohol Testing Policy
The 12 things every testing policy must include. It’s hard to enforce a workplace drugs and alcohol policy without a meaningful testing process. But testing is also a lightning rod for […]
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Drugs/Alcohol Testing Policy Checklist
PROBLEM: One of the biggest challenges is developing a fair, tough drug and alcohol testing policy that balances the organization’s need to protect safety with employees’ rights under privacy and discrimination […]
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Workplace Drugs & Alcohol Cases Scorecard, 2020 to 2021
Employers continue to lose more drug test cases than they win. October 17, 2021 marks the third anniversary of legalized recreational cannabis in Canada. Slowly but surely, courts, arbitrators and labour […]
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Workplace Impairment Removal Policy
Establish your right to send workers home if they're drunk or high. Here’s a template of a policy providing for the immediate removal of workers who are impaired by drugs, alcohol […]
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Substance Abuse Red Flags Checklist
Workers aren't likely to disclose their own substance abuse problems. The first step in helping and making accommodations for workers with substance abuse problems is knowing about those problems. Ideally, workers […]
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3 Years After the Legalization of Marijuana in Canada: An OHS Compliance Update
It’s been nearly 3 years since Canada legalized recreational marihuana use. Since 2018, a new “legal” industry has emerged, tax revenues have grown - though not nearly at the pace […]
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Your Right to Immediately Remove Workers Impaired by Drugs or Alcohol
Keeping drunk and high workers out of the workplace to prevent danger. It goes without saying that being drunk or high on the job is a significant safety risk, especially when […]
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Requiring Disclosure of Legal Drugs Allowed Only for Safety-Sensitive Workers
A Crown corporation in Québec adopted a policy requiring dockworkers to disclose their use of medical marijuana or other legally prescribed medications that could potentially impair them at work. The […]
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Failing to Disclose Medical Marijuana Use Doesn’t Cost Worker His Job
A welder on a last-chance agreement and subject to random testing knew that ingesting medical marijuana might cause him to flunk his drug test. But since the pot was legally […]
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Nuclear Plants Can’t Do Random Drug Testing Until Privacy Issues Are Resolved
After 10 years of study, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission issued a regulation requiring nuclear power plants to perform random alcohol and drug testing on safety-sensitive workers. As expected, when […]
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Positive Urine + Negative Oral Swab Test Don’t Prove Marijuana Impairment
A federal arbitrator reinstated a railway worker who was fired after testing positive for marijuana. The hi-rail truck derailment incident in which he was involved wasn’t reasonable cause for drug […]
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