Page 14 - GBC summer 2018 english

ALBERTA CASE LAW
Summary termination of Superintendent for sexual harassment was upheld
In September 2017, an Alberta court found that a golf course was justi ed in terminating the employment of its Superintendent as a result of sexual harass- ment directed towards one of his subordinates.
The Superintendent had taken a romantic interest in a female employee, who was a member of the grounds crew and who reported directly to the Superintendent. Initially, the two had struck up a bit of a friendship outside of work and had socialized together on occasion.
However, when the employee, who was a single mother and 32 years younger than the Superintendent, made it clear to him that she was not interested in a romantic relationship, he began to act in a way that the court found completely inappropriate.
The Superintendent sent her numerous text and email messages of a personal nature, and continued to do so after she clearly asked him to stop. In some of these messages he professed his romantic feelings for her and at times made inappropriate comments (e.g., commenting on how good she looked at work).
The Superintendent sometimes gave the employee preferential treatment at work (e.g., he promoted her and gave her a parking space in front of the building, beside his own), while at other times he exhibited anger and jealously towards her, making her feel like she was being monitored more closely and subjected to more severe criticism than her co-workers.
The evidence con rmed that there was a high degree of tension between the Superintendent and the employee, which had a negative impact on the rest of the employees. Over the course of a few months the Superintendent’s behaviour became increasingly aggressive, leaving the employee feeling threatened and intimidated.
The employee had not made any formal or informal complaints to the Superintendent’s superiors (i.e., the Management Committee or owners of the course) but had spoken to the Assistant Superintendent, who suggested that she should bring her concerns to the attention of management.
She wrote a letter outlining all of her con- cerns about the Superintendent’s behaviour and delivered copies to all of the members of the
Management Committee. The following day, the Superintendent was called to a meeting of the Management Committee. He was given a copy of the letter and was asked to respond.
The Superintendent denied the allegations made against him and his employment was terminated the following day. He sued the golf course claiming that he was wrongfully dis- missed.
The court found that the facts in this case were suf ciently serious that immediate termina- tion of the Superintendent’s employment was justi ed. Although the golf course did not have a harassment policy in place at the time of these events, and did not conduct any investigation into the allegations, many of the claims made by the employee were admitted to by the Superintendent at the trial.
The court cited this fact, and the fact that the Superintendent initially denied the allegations and later either failed or refused to acknowledge the seriousness of his behaviour, in support of its conclusion that termination was an appropriate response.
Another key factor was that the Superintendent had been the employee’s direct and only supervi- sor and the only higher-ranking employee with whom she had contact virtually every day.
As a member of the golf course’s management team, the court held that the Superintendent “had an obligation to create and cultivate a safe and proper workplace environment for [her] and his other direct reports.” By his conduct, the Superintendent had failed to meet this obligation and had instead created fear, frustration and acrimony in his department.
In all of the circumstances, the court found that the golf course’s failure to conduct an inves- tigation and its failure to warn the Superinten- dent that he might be red if his behaviour continued were not fatal, given the seriousness of the allegations that had been made against him.
In all of the circumstances, the duty that the golf course owed to its employees, to provide them with a safe working environment free from harassment, outweighed any procedural entitlements claimed by the Superintendent.
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