This article was first published on rabble.ca.
COVID-19 has brought a lot of things into sharp focus for most of us — what we value; divisions in our society between those who can and cannot work from home; how we enjoy spending time; the quality of our domestic relationships; the challenge of “stay at home” for the homeless; how access to technology divides us; who we enjoy spending time with; etc. Continue reading “Where there’s a will, there’s a way forward”
This article was first published on rabble.ca.
This publication and others have written about the shocking acts of violence and intimidation toward Mi’kmaw lobster fishers in Nova Scotia following the inauguration of a fishery in St. Mary’s Bay by the Sipekne’katik First Nation in September 2020. Continue reading “Court order gives Mi’kmaw fishers temporary protections, but what are the next steps?”
This article was first published on rabble.ca.
The COVID-19 pandemic has had the unique ability to highlight social areas where inequality and inequity have been lurking for ages. Gender discrimination in the workplace is no exception.
There have been countless articles addressing the extra burden that the pandemic has placed on women, often centring the many complexities of domestic labour division and child care. Even without these larger issues, smaller forms of discrimination, or microaggressions, persist during the pandemic as well, even as our work lives have moved almost entirely online.
It has never been easier to work remotely, and professionals across the country have been lauding the advancements in technology that have made working possible during the pandemic. Zoom meetings, “fax by email,” Facetime calls, constant texting — they all allow employers to replicate the workplace experience for employees from the comfort of their home offices (or living room couches, or kitchens, or bedrooms). For many women, these technologies have not only replicated the issues they already experienced at work, but have exacerbated them.
Continue reading “Non-profit boards: try not to ‘Zoom’ past equitable governance”
This article was first published on rabble.ca
In the course of my work and in reading the news lately, I am seeing a lot of issues come up involving workplace health and safety. Many of those issues are related to COVID-19 — for example, some employers are deciding to let staff work remotely for the rest of the year, and some employees that are being called back to work are expressing concerns about the safety of doing so.
However, even in the midst of the pandemic, there are still non-COVID related workplace health and safety issues, and possibly the highest profile issue of that nature in Canada recently involves the allegations of workplace harassment made against the Governor General. The allegations have garnered a lot of media attention, but the unfortunate reality is that they are not that unusual. It is only because the allegations involve the Governor General that they are getting media coverage, and not because of the subject matter of the allegations. With that in mind, I thought it would be worthwhile to take a look at a couple of issues that often arise in the context of workplace harassment. Continue reading “What you should know about workplace harassment”
This article was first published on rabble.ca
Think back.
March 13, 2020.
While many of us moved our offices to our homes, scrambled to figure out how to school our children, fought for scarce toilet paper and Lysol, and started to get used to a completely different way of living, the government released its “What We Heard Report A Public Consultations on Medical Assistance in Dying.” The report resulted from a 14 day window in January when Canadians commented online about the medical assistance in dying law in Canada (called MAID).
Regular rabble.ca readers will know that I wrote a three-part series about the legalization of MAID and its implementation from my first-hand experience: my husband, Jack, died with medical assistance in November 2018.
The federal government legalized MAID in 2016. You’ll know from my account and those of many others, that the MAID law is not without its critics because of those excluded from the legislation: mature minors; those wanting to make “advance requests”; those whose only medical condition is mental illness; and those with physical illness but for whom death is not reasonably foreseeable. The Council of Canadian Academies has studied and reported on the first three of these issues.
Continue reading “Federal government should prioritize moving MAID back up its legislative agenda”
This article was first published on rabble.ca
What is a landlord’s responsibility when a tenant in a multi-residential building tests positive for COVID-19? Is a landlord obligated to share this information with other residents so they can take extra precautions? On the flip side, what expectation of privacy do tenants have if they share this information with their landlord?
Many of our firm’s housing clients have had to grapple with this difficult balance over the past few months as they weather the challenges brought on by the pandemic. Continue reading “The right to know? Balancing health risks and privacy rights for landlords during COVID-19”
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