The British Columbia Court of Appeal weighs in on notice periods for short-service employees induced to leave long-term employment. An employee with 17 months of service (after leaving a job he held for 27 years) was terminated without cause at the same time as 15 other employees due to downsizing. He argued that he was induced to leave his former employment and should receive a 12-18 month notice period. The employer argued that there was equal interest in having the employee resign his former role to join the employer (i.e., no inducement because they were both “doing the dance together”) and a notice period of 5 months was appropriate. The trial judge noted that but for the inducement, the 5 month notice period already provided by the employer probably would have been sufficient. However, the judge found that there was some measure of inducement that warranted a modest bump and awarded a notice period of 12 months. On appeal, the Panel didn’t seem overwhelmingly supportive of the notice period awarded by the trial judge, but didn’t find it so inordinately high as to warrant appellant intervention. The Court of Appeal also noted there is no formula for how to determine the impact of inducement on the notice period and that it must be dealt with in the circumstances of each case: Mercer Celgar Limited Partnership v. Ferweda, 2025 BCCA 120

Staying in BC for a moment, the British Columbia Supreme Court granted, in part, the application of an employer seeking an injunction for the return of confidential information from a former employee, restraining him from soliciting the business of the employer’s clients, and allowing a forensic audit of the employee’s electronic devices. The parties are in the business of supplying garbage bins and the former employee had been engaged as the Territory Manager to grow the business in the greater Vancouver area. After the relationship began to sour, the employer reviewed the employee’s work computer and found he had been looking for jobs, cleared out his desktop, deleted a bunch of files, and made changes to his email account. They also found an unusually high level of activity on the employee’s OneDrive account. Further investigation ensued, the employee went on sick leave, and never returned to work. Two months after the employee’s non-competition and non-solicitation period expired, he began working for a competitor. The court reviewed the test for an interim injunction and found it was met with respect to the request for an injunction regarding the return of confidential information (the employee did admit to taking two client files). The court was not willing to infer from what the employer thought was an unusually high number of client cancellations after the employee’s departure that the employee must have been misusing confidential information to solicit the employer’s clients. The court also denied the forensic examination injunction (basically an Anton Piller order) sought by the employer finding that the employee did not meet the high burden of the Celanese test which, in addition to a strong prima facie case requires “the applicant to establish actual or potential serious damage from the alleged misconduct, convincing evidence that the defendant has incriminating documents in their possession, and a real possibility that the defendant may destroy material before discovery” NSD Disposal Limited v Ruppel, 2025 BCSC 690

The Saskatchewan Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal of an order of the Court of King’s Bench striking a claim brought by the plaintiff for failing to disclose a reasonable claim. The plaintiff claimed she had been constructively dismissed and alleged other parties who were not her employer were guilty of bad faith conduct, negligence, and negligent investigation. The KB judge found the parties did not owe the plaintiff a duty of care and dismissed the claim as against them. The Court of Appeal found the judge had correctly applied the Anns/Cooper test in determining there was no sufficient relationship of proximity or foreseeability of harm to find a duty of care owed to the plaintiff. The same analysis applied to the allegations of negligent investigation. Of personal interest to me for… reasons… the Court of Appeal also found that the judge below did not violate the audi alteram partem rule by relying on authorities relevant to an issue raised by the parties but which had not been submitted by the parties: Hollinger v SaskTel Centre, 2025 SKCA 40

In another restrictive covenant case from British Columbia, the BC Supreme Court declined to issue an interim injunction restraining the defendants from engaging in “associate dentist recruitment services in Canada” because the description of the company’s business in the agreement didn’t clearly cover the kind of activity the plaintiffs wanted to prevent the defendants from doing. The court noted that it is possible the plaintiffs could win their case for an injunction at trial, but the record before it on this application did not meet the first branch of the test for an injunction. Make sure you describe your company’s business carefully in your agreements, people: Heaps & Doyle Practice Solutions Inc. v Pacula, 2025 BCSC 699

The British Columbia Supreme Court determined a class proceeding was not the way to go for a group of around 100 former employees of a modular home construction company who were terminated without cause, notice, or pay in lieu of notice when the company wound down operations and entered bankruptcy: Linza v Metric Modular, 2025 BCSC 646

In the ongoing litigation involving the former CEO of AHS, the court decided to adjourn the defendants’ application for an injunction requiring the plaintiff to return, delete, and cease using what it claims are confidential records she sent to her personal email account prior to her termination. The adjournment will allow the defendants to question the plaintiff. However, the court placed tight restrictions around the nature of the questions to be asked in order to protect the integrity of the various ongoing investigations. The ultimate decision on whether the plaintiff has to return those records will be interesting as plenty of employees retain copies of confidential employer information in an effort to CYA when they think termination is on the table: Mentzelopoulos v Alberta Health Services, 2025 ABKB 235

Midway through the Complainant’s testimony in a duty of fair representation complaint, the union objected suggesting that the Complainant was testifying to evidence contradicting earlier testimony that was not put to a witness (a la Browne v Dunn) and, generally, was introducing evidence to contradict the evidence of his own witnesses. After careful consideration, the Board allowed the Complainant to introduce this evidence and provided a helpful summary of the principles underlying the general laws of evidence that inform the Board’s approach to an evidentiary dispute: Hibbert v International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron Ship Builders, Blacksmiths, Forgers and Helpers, Local Lodge No. 146, 2025 ALRB 40