Legislation in Ontario affects human resources. Some can be bad well others can be beneficial to the workplace. My paper will be focusing on the federal legislations in Ontario and how it is improving various non-unionized workplaces. At the end of my report I will be summarizing the concept of family status related to the 11 prohibited grounds in a case study regarding a single mom and how she almost lost her job with CN Rail.
Description of Legislation in Ontario and why they are good for the workplace
The first legislation I am going to be talking about is the Pay Equity Act. The act was passed in order to restore sex-based wage discrimination in Ontario workplaces. The Equity Act applies to all public sector employees and private. In general the act identifies the rate of pay by comparing payment to female job classes with those paid to male job classes of similar value. In non-unionized workplaces, employers are having the freedom to review the Pay Equity Plan and make recommendations in order to change it. An example of the Pay Equity Act would be if you have a female and male both working as a swampier for an oil field company. They both have the same job responsibilities and work the same hours. If the boss of the company where to pay the male more because he was stronger and in general male and pay the women less that would be a violation. The women would have the right to contact Human Resources and file a complaint against her boss, and get the same rate of pay prior to the male. The Pay equity act in my opinion is important in the workplace because it creates equality and minimizes stereotypes against women in the workplace. You never want to be in a business or visit one that has an awkward atmosphere related to se...
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...are powerful they could control her because they have the upper hand. It just proves to show how certain companies can take for granted individuals and not listen to their concern which is unethical and discriminating.
Works Cited
Finance, P. (2005, 08 05). Cn employee won $35,000 for family status discrimination. Retrieved from http://www.thestar.com/business/personal_finance/2013/09/17/cn_employee_won_35000_for_family_status_discrimination.html
Human Rights, O. (2012, 05 01). Employment discrimination based on family status (fact sheet) - see more at: http://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/employment-discrimination-based-family-status-fact-sheet
Teacher, L. (2012, 05 08). Legislation affecting recruitment and selection in canada. Retrieved from http://www.lawteacher.net/employment-law/essays/legislation-affecting-recruitment-and-selection-in-canada-employment-law-essay.php
Zong L. & Perry, B. (2011). Chinese immigrants in Canada and social injustice: From overt to
Martin, Sheilah L. "R. V. Morgentaler Et Al." Canadian Journal Of Women & The Law 1.1 (1985): 194-205. Academic Search Complete. Web. 16 Nov. 2013.
Summary: Canada should commit to developing and passing a compulsory and proactive pay equity law similar to Iceland to address pay inequality and outline corrective actions to close the gender wage gaps in workforces. It is recommended that a pay equity law should be passed to ensure that there is a fair pay system in place that is transparent and free from gender biases. The pay equity law will require employers to identify and correct gender discriminations that are present in the workplace
Canadian workplaces today seem to be a fairly diverse place, with a blend of many religions, ethnicities, and genders present. However, although people preach affirmative action and melting pots in current times, many inequality and power issues still abound. One strikingly noticeable example is gender discrimination. Women in the workforce face many challenges like smaller wages, harassment, male privilege in hiring or promotions, and lack of support when pregnant or raising children. One half of the planet is women, and it can be assumed the same for Canada, but they still face judgment at work because they lack the authority to dispute against big corporations or even their male supervisor. It cannot be argued that Canadian women’s status has worsened over the past hundred years, of course, thanks to feminism and activism. However, their status is not as high as it could be. Women as a group first started fighting for workplace equality during the second wave of feminism, from the 1960s to the 1990s. Legislation was approved during the second wave to try to bring gender equality to the workplace. Feminists both collided and collaborated with unions and employers to ensure women received fair treatment in an occupation. Quebec had the same issues, only the province approached the conflict differently than English Canada with its own unique viewpoint. It became clear that women were entering the workplace and did not plan on leaving. Second-wave feminism in Canada shifted power from the government and businesses to women in order to try to bring equality, although the discrimination never completely disappeared.
Employment discrimination includes unequal treatment in employment decisions, opportunities, hiring and firing, compensation, promotion done by the supervisor and management on the basis of nurses’ race, origin, color, religion and language (Walani, 2015). In some cases even the patients refuge to be treated from a nurse with certain ethnic or national background. In Primeau’s study (2014), one IEN reports that a patient denied her care and said, “I don’t want to be treated by a terrorist”. Moreover, immigrant nurses are often employed in less desirable areas, lower positions and are excluded from the opportunities which could promote them easily to higher positions ((Li, 2014). Discrimination is not only unethical but also an illegal practice at any workplace. However, sometimes the IENs themselves acknowledge that they have less confidence and take inequality for granted. So, they do not report some cases of discrimination. Moreover, even the colleagues, patients and families treat the IENs with aggression, resentment, less trust and uncooperative manner (College of Nurses of Ontario [CNO], 2007). Sometimes, the coworkers intentionally misunderstand and underestimate the IENs’ education and skills and bully them (Kingma, 2007). A study by Hagey shows that immigrant black nurses also face racial discrimination in nursing employment in Canada (2001).
The struggle for pay equity is part of America's evolving sense of what is fair and just. After all, slavery was once an accepted part of this democratic nation; union
Teelucksingh, C., & Edward-Galabuzi, G. (2005). C. Teelucksingh & G. Edward-Galabuzi (Eds.), Working Precariously: The impact of race and immigrants status on employment opportunities and outcomes in CanadaToronto: The Canadian Race Relations Foundation.
Systemic discrimination has been a part of Canada’s past. Women, racial and ethnic minorities as well as First Nations people have all faced discrimination in Canada. Policies such as, Charter of Rights and Freedoms, provincial and federal Human Rights Codes, as well has various employment equity programs have been placed in Canada’s constitution to fight and address discrimination issues. Despite these key documents placed for universal rights and freedoms Aboriginal and other minority populations in Canada continue to be discriminated against. Many believe there is no discrimination in Canada, and suggest any lack of success of these groups is a result of personal decisions and not systemic discrimination. While others feel that the legislation and equality policies have yet resulted in an equal society for all minorities. Racism is immersed in Canadian society; this is clearly shown by stories of racial profiling in law enforcement.
“Honey, you’re not a person, now get back in the kitchen and make me a sandwich!” If a husband were to say these words to his wife today, he would likely receive a well-deserved smack to the face. It is not until recently that Canadian women have received their status as people and obtained equal rights as men. Women were excluded from an academic education and received a lesser pay than their male counter parts. With the many hardships women had to face, women were considered the “slave of slaves” (Women’s Rights). In the past century, women have fought for their rights, transitioning women from the point of being a piece of property to “holding twenty-five percent of senior positions in Canada” (More women in top senior positions: Report). The Married Women’s Property Act, World War I, The Person’s Case, and Canadian Human Rights Act have gained Canadian women their rights.
If Ontario is able to get an equal pay law that essentially benefits women than America should consider looking into their law. With the amount of schooling both men and women are required to go through in order to obtain a certain job, there should be some type of equal wage involved. In England, there is a similar situation going on involving the wage gap. Where several women believe that they are not getting the fair amount of income when it comes to the amount of time and effort they put into the job. Amanda Stratton, an entrepreneur and co-founder of Hacker Studios, believes that individuals should find solutions from an evidence-based perspective in order end wage discrimination (“Women’s”). By doing this, it will help with the common usage of basis towards males and females on whether they deserve to get paid more than one another.
Racial discrimination in the workplace has been a persistent theme in Canada’s history as well as present-day times. The occurrence of actions and attitudes that impose a sense of one being less equal than another on the basis of one’s race in Canada’s workplace inhibits both our nation’s ability to move forward as well as strengthen unification within our country. The belief in a more egalitarian society, where one’s race and ethnic background have little to no impact on employees (or potential employees) standings within the job market, would seemingly be reinforced by the majority of Canadians, who consistently show support for Canada’s multicultural identity. Couple that with the noticeable strides Canada has made in the past several decades through legislation, in order to eliminate discriminatory practices and actions within the workplace, and one would likely assume that racial discrimination within the workplace is largely a concern of the past. However, current research supports the argument that the level of which racial discrimination occurs today is increasing, and as such it persists to be a key problem in the current workplace of the nation. In the workplace, racial discrimination is often seen with regard to uneven access to jobs, unfair selection and promotion criteria (as well as access to the means in order to meet this criteria), and workplace harassment. This paper compares similar findings of two articles; the first, Racial inequality in employment in Canada, as was published in the Canadian Public Administration (CPA), and the second, What Are Immigrants’ Experiences of Discrimination in the Workplace?, published by the Toronto Immigrant Employment Data Initiative (TIEDI).
The Equal Pay Act (part of the Fair Labor Standards Act), forbids employers to compensate women differently for jobs that are “substantially equal”, that is, almost identical. Traditionally, women have worked in different occupations than men; these occupations tend to be substantially different, pay less and confer less authority.
Krahn, Lowe, Hughes (2008) Work, Industry, & Canadian Society. (5th ed.) Toronto, ON: Nelson Education Ltd.
Unfortunately these beliefs has played a major part in shaping Canada’s social policies and programs. Women with disabilities continue to be at a larger disadvantage because of not only their disability but their gender as well, this has not changed over time. Canada provided the first national constitution which provides individuals with disabilities rights for equality. This was implemented into the Canadian Charter of Rights & Freedoms (Thun, 2007, p. 355). “1 in 5 Americans has a disability, with more than half (53%) of these persons with disabilities being female” (Fairchild, 2002, p. 16). Before the American Disability Act of 1990 (Chima, 2005, p.40) there was no one officially advocating for persons with disabilities. Even now with people advocating for persons with a disability, they continue to encounter discrimination with employment, which was a promised to be solved from the American Disability Act (Chima, 2005, p. 40). It was stated by Statistics Canada that “despite numerous positive stories and experiences, persons with disabilities remain less likely than others to be employed” (Turcotte, 2014, p. 1). The Employment Equality Act of Canada was introduced with persons with disabilities continued to have extremely low employment rates. This Act was established with a purpose to “achieve equality within the workplace” (Thun, 2007, p.
Many job seekers will face employment discrimination or perhaps to be treated differently because of their skin color, age, or religion. Although it is illegal to discriminate in hiring and firing, however, one of the mo...