Millions of Canadians with enhanced cases and virtually no valid contracts to reduce their claims: what a lethal combination for employers. And it was!

But now, it will change again.

It seems that virtually all lawyers are now calling themselves “employment lawyers“ with its seemingly simple path to the comparative riches which employment law appeared to represent, particularly compared to other areas which COVID-19 had been less friendly to.

So, there’s an increasingly crowded field with many lawyers bearing rather dubious qualifications to call themselves experts. Had they ever tried a single wrongful dismissal case, argued an appeal, been asked for advice by a single in-house counsel on behalf of an employer, written even one academic article or taught lawyers at a professional conference? But employment lawyers they profess to be, however limited their actual knowledge and however minimal threat they may pose to experienced opposing counsel.

Many do not realize that, although an employee may have a theoretical claim to 12 or 24 months’ severance, wrongful dismissal damages are designed to protect employees against unemployment so that, if they obtain a new job at the same or greater pay after, say, four months, all a court will award is those four months, not 12 or 24. Moreover, if the employer can prove that the employee could have found such work with reasonable effort, the employee will be treated as if she actually found such work.

Therefore, when acting for employees, I have them conduct and document a detailed job search to prove that they were seeking employment. Failure to look, as I mentioned, can be fatal.

But when acting for employers, I conduct a parallel job search to show the ready availability of opportunities for that suing employee.