A federal judge has ruled in a precedent-setting case compelling employees to wear a mask at work during the COVID-19 pandemic was unreasonable.
Complaints that maskless workplaces pose a danger to employees’ health are frivolous, ruled the judge, per Blacklock’s Reporter.
The decision marked the final chapter in pandemic mandates that forced millions to wear masks in public.
“It is unreasonable,” Justice Benoit Duchesne of the Federal Court ruled in the case of an Elections Canada manager who complained he felt unsafe after the office mask mandate was lifted in 2023.
The manager was fully vaccinated and had no particular health issues, the court found.
Nicolas Juzda, chief of field programs at Elections Canada, said he was put at risk after the agency ordered employees back to work at its Gatineau, QC, headquarters without mandatory masking.
“I must excuse my right to refuse work that constitutes a danger,” wrote Juzda, citing the Canada Labour Code. Section 128.1 of the law states federally regulated staff may refuse work “that constitutes a danger to the employee.”
“COVID-19 is a disease that in addition to often being extremely unpleasant during the acute period poses significant risks including death,” wrote Juzda.
“Handwashing and workplace cleaning are of minimal use in limiting the spread of COVID-19.”
Voluntary masking “reduces the risk of contracting COVID-19 but is of limited effectiveness if not combined with other measures, particularly during prolonged exposure to unmasked infected individuals such as being nearby in an indoor office for an entire day,” wrote Juzda.
Management dismissed the claim
“The matter is frivolous,” wrote one executive. Duchesne agreed.
“The applicant’s concern about an unsafe workplace was based on his assessment that a significant number of people would return to the workplace under the return-to-work model, that any of these people may have contracted COVID-19 and that the non-mandatory recommendations and precautions relating to COVID-19 fell short of what he believes would be a safe work environment,” wrote the court.
The concerns were unwarranted, it said.
Cabinet enforced mask mandates from April 20, 2020 to February 14, 2023. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau maintained the mandate was recommended by scientists though the Public Health Agency never made such a recommendation.
“We followed the recommendations of public health experts, doctors and scientists,” Trudeau told reporters in 2022.
“We will continue to monitor the situation and follow the science.”
Dr. Howard Njoo, deputy chief public health officer, told reporters earlier in 2022 that mandates were not required.
“We want people to be sort of informed and make that a voluntary choice,” he said.
“It doesn’t have to be because there is a mandate.”
Dr. Theresa Tam, chief public health officer, went further in the first weeks of the pandemic in dismissing masks as pointless.
“There is no need to use a mask for well people,” she told reporters in 2020.
“It hasn’t been proven really to protect you from getting the virus.”
