Termination Inappropriate for Workers? Bullying of Co-Worker

An employer fired two workers for harassing and bullying a co-worker. For example, they allegedly called him names, threw a face shield at him and because he told a supervisor other workers were taking longer breaks or not wearing PPE, put stickers of rats on his locker. An arbitrator found that the fired workers clearly had animosity toward their co-worker and had engaged in some harassment. But without direct evidence of their involvement, the arbitrator refused to hold them responsible for some of the incidents. It concluded that the workers did make inappropriate statements, which were bullying, harassing and intimidating, and they showed no remorse afterwards. But termination was too serious a penalty. So the arbitrator imposed a suspension instead and ordered them to be reinstated [Hendrickson Spring ‘ Stratford Operations v. United Steelworkers and its Local 8773, [2015] CanLII 60008 (ON LA), Sept. 21, 2015].