Canada: Employment Law Update

I'll note two good articles on recent Canadian employment law rulings that are of considerable importance:

• Lawyers Weekly has Suing abusive employers in tort, a fine piece by Steve Levitt on the December, 2008 decision of the Ontario Superior Court in Piresferrerira v. Ayotte and Bell Mobility, [2008] O.J. No. 518. In that case, the employer, Bell Mobility was ordered to pay damages to an employee of $500,095, largely for the abusive and tortious acts of a Bell supervisor. Last month, the telecommunications giant was ordered to pay the additional sum of $225,000.00 in costs

• In Judicial Interpretation Of Restrictive Covenants, Ottawa Business Journal provides a good summary by Jordan Plener on the January, 2009 ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada in Shafron v. KRG Insurance Brokers (Western) Inc., 2009 SCC 6 (CanLII). In Shafron, the Supreme Court of Canada overturned a ruling of the British Columbia Court of Appeal that had liberally interpreted and enforced a non-competition covenant that purported to restrict a former employee's ability to work in the Greater Vancouver area. The Supreme Court of Canada held the employer to the strict wording of the covenant, which referred to the non-existent entity of the "Metropolitan City of Vancouver" and refused to enforce the covenant. As Mr. Plener succinctly put it, "In arriving at this conclusion, the Supreme Court held that an ambiguous restrictive covenant is prima facie unreasonable and unenforceable."

- Garry J. Wise, Toronto

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