As a preliminary comment, it should be observed that disabled employees who carry out their professional activity in a normal working environment are considered as full-fledged employees and thus benefit from the same rights as any employee. Moreover, and in any event, an employee is never obliged to disclose his/her disability situation to his/her employer.
The legal background
An employment contract is above all a contract which is governed and subject to general rules applicable to any agreement entered into by two or more parties. In particular, contract law generally allows the parties to agree on the termination of the contract by which they are bound. Drawing the consequences from
On November 21, 2013, the Supreme Court of Canada denied an employer’s application for leave to appeal the BC Court of Appeal decision in Lacey v. Weyerhaeuser Company Limited, 2013 BCCA 252. That decision had awarded damages to 5 retirees for reductions made by the employer to its contribution to the cost of
In Germany, discriminating against disabled employees is prohibited by the General Equal Treatment Act (Allgemeines Gleichbehandlungsgesetz). This law provides very comprehensive protection against discrimination of any kind. In addition, severely disabled employees have special rights and protection under the German Social Code (Sozialgesetzbuch IX).
1 General Equal Treatment Act
As this
Before the Disability Discrimination Act came into force in 1996, there was no specific protection from discrimination for disabled employees in the UK. The law on disability discrimination is now set out in the Equality Act 2010 (“the Act”) which provides for protection from discrimination in the workplace on the grounds of a number of
Yes, disabled employees are protected against discrimination in Venezuela pursuant to the Disable Person’s Law and the Organic Law on Prevention, Working Conditions, and the Work Environment. In fact, there is an express prohibition of discrimination by reason of incapacity.
The purpose of the Disabled Persons’ Law is to establish the rules according to which
In October 2013, an arbitrator rejected a union argument that publication of individuals’ names in an arbitral award was possible only with their consent. In Sunrise Poultry Processors Ltd. v. United Food & Commercial Workers, Local 1518, 2013 CanLII 70673, the arbitrator held that disclosure was favoured as a general rule and that
This article was written by Stephan May, a candidate attorney at Norton Rose Fulbright South Africa
With the rise in popularity of reggae music in the western world in the 1970’s, the wearing of dreadlocks has become an increasingly fashionable hairstyle for both men and women. This hairstyle, however, is often met with scepticism due
In June, a majority of the Supreme Court held, in United Food and Commercial Workers, Local 503 v Wal-Mart Canada Corp., 2014 SCC 45, that an arbitrator had reached a reasonable conclusion in finding that Wal-Mart’s 2005 closure of a Quebec store constituted a prohibited unilateral change in conditions of employment following the
This article was written by Benazir Cassim, a candidate attorney at Norton Rose Fulbright South Africa
Section 23 of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act (BCEA) addresses the proof required by an employer when an employee stays away from work due to incapacity arising from illness or injury. The employer may ask the employee