What happens when employers and employees no longer see eye to eye The Toronto Humane Society in Toronto. Google Street View By Shaun Bernstein and Stuart Rudner When we provide counsel to employers, we continually repeat one key phrase: “Your workplace, your rules.” Generally speaking, an employee’s refusal to carry out her superior’s directions will constitute insubordination. When it comes to governing employee conduct, employers really are in the driver’s seat. So long as the employee is not being ordered to do anything illegal or completely outside the scope of her duties, the employer more or less has free reign. Occasionally, an issue arises where an employee refuses to follow his employer’s directions due to a moral objection. Simply put, he may have a moral disagreement with what he has been asked to do, and the question arises: Does this refusal constitute insubordination? In a recent decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal, the Christian Medical and Dental Society of Canada challenged the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario’s policy that physicians who refuse to perform certain procedures due to their own medical or ethical reasons must refer the patient to a colleague who will provide those services. […]
