About David Hyde
Understanding and addressing crime in the workplace
This column will address the increasingly important subject of crime in the workplace. A review of news headlines across Canada on any given day shows the sheer prevalence and harmful impact of work-related crime. Organizations have a moral and legal obligation to understand the crime threats they face and to take diligent steps in managing crime and security risks.
David Hyde
10 minutes read
May 24, 2013 
‘If you see something, say something’ in the workplace
It’s been a month marred by violence and disruption. In recent days we have witnessed the troubling arrests of alleged terrorists in Toronto and Montreal, the heinous Boston Marathon Bombing, a violent takeover robbery and double-shooting at a Toronto bank, the assault of a Port Coquitlam, BC security guard, and sexual assaults at a Toronto community college to name a few. Each of these incidents had (or would have had) an impact on the workplace.
David Hyde
New case helps to further define the difference between “workplace harassment” and “legitimate management conduct”
The Ontario Labour Relations Board (“the Board”) has provided additional legal interpretation of workplace harassment under the Occupational Health and Safety Act (“OHSA”) in Amodeo v Craiglee Nursing Home Limited, 2012 CanLII 53919 (ON LRB), which was decided on September 19th, 2012. In drawing a clear distinction between “workplace harassment” and “legitimate management conduct”, the Board has provided some welcome direction on this sometimes contentious workplace issue.
David Hyde
Video surveillance and the workplace – Part 2
A mixture of incognizance and apathy often prevails in the private sector when it comes to understanding and applying legal privacy considerations in the installation and use of video cameras…
David Hyde
Employers must now treat verbal threats as serious offences under the OHSA’s definition of workplace violence
A recent labour arbitrator’s decision—to uphold the City of Kingston’s right to terminate a 28-year employee for issuing a verbal threat against a co-worker—was based in large part on the arbitrator’s view that “the classification of threatening language as workplace violence” under the Occupational Health and Safety Act represents a “clear and significant change” to the law in Ontario.
David Hyde