Many employers continue to experience confusion respecting the new upcoming Federal statutory holiday – the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. The new holiday, which will be recognized on September 30th starting this year, was introduced by the Federal government in June, and originally only applied to federally regulated employers who are governed by the Canada Labour Code. The confusion, in part, stems from the fact that many provinces and municipalities have recently come out and said they will recognize the holiday. What does this mean for your business? Truthfully, unless you are a public sector employer, i.e. schools, government, etc., not much.
In particular, British Columbia, North West Territories, Manitoba, Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and the Yukon will be recognizing the holiday for its public sector employees. However, private sector employers in those provinces (and elsewhere), which represents the majority of our clients, can decide if they’d like to provide the day off to their employees as it’s still not required.
A select few individual cities, municipalities and regions in the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, New Brunswick have also chosen to recognize the day for their city/regional workers, again not private companies.
Quebec will not recognize the day and Nunavut has yet to release any statements regarding the holiday.
For further information on the day, we refer you to our original e-Alert on the topic, found here.
Again, this day is only a statutory holiday for federally regulated employers, and for some public sector employers as mentioned above.
If you are a unionized workplace, we encourage you to check your collective agreements on how to proceed with the new holiday.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to speak with an e2r™ Advisor.