Cumulative Just Cause: How Progressive Is Your Discipline Policy?

Originally published Winter 2005

Employers often wonder whether it is possible to terminate an employee for repeated poor performance or carelessness where the breaches by the employee cover a range of activities, including breaches of company policy and performance issues. Often times, the employer is found by the Court to have failed to institute a proper regime of counseling and warnings sufficient to meet the high onus for a just cause termination where performance is the only issue. In Daley v. Depco International Inc.¹, Mr. Justice Echlin of the Ontario Supreme Court of Justice, provides a reasoned analysis and approach that employers will find instructive for properly instituting and enforcing performance based discipline.