Employment

As 2023 winds down and the new year approaches, here are some of the key employment law changes recently made in Ontario, as well as some potential developments that may be enacted in 2024.

Many employers experienced whiplash in 2023 from the flurry of judicial, administrative and legislative activity aimed at restricting the use of employee non-competition, non-solicitation, and non-disclosure agreements. Can you still require your employees to sign a non-compete agreement? What about requiring your employees to assign their inventions to your business? What updates to your agreement templates are required to ensure compliance with the latest changes in your jurisdiction? We summarize the relevant legal changes below, forecast what employers can expect in 2024 (spoiler alert – expect even more change), and offer practical tips for how best to comply in the ever-changing landscape of employee restrictive covenants.

Read about workplace implications of president biden’s executive order addressing artificial intelligence in the latest edition of AI: The Washington Report, a joint undertaking of Mintz and ML Strategies covering potential federal legislative, executive, and regulatory activities related to AI.

In her first public comments since its passage, New York Governor Kathy Hochul expressed a desire to see changes in New York’s proposed ban on non-compete agreements (SB 3100) before she would consider signing the bill.

California employers need to be prepared for new laws that become effective starting in the new year. Here is a brief overview of those laws (including the collection of diversity for venture capital companies, an amendment in non-compete law, new protections for workplace violence and harassment, increased and expanded leaves, new presumption of retaliation for protected activities, and updates to workplace cannabis laws), their effective dates, and what employers should do now to prepare.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") released its Proposed Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace.  In light of recent legal developments, such as the Bostock v. Clayton County decision, which held that Title IX protects transgender persons from discrimination on the basis of sex, the #MeToo movement, the increase in remote work, changes to abortion rights, and changes in the way harassment may occur (e.g., online bullying or harassment), the proposed guidance illustrates the EEOC’s current interpretation of “existing requirements of the law” and/or its policies.  Here are some notable parts of the guidance:

In 2020, New York City amended its paid sick leave law, named the Earned Safe and Sick Time Act (“ESSTA”), to better align with New York State’s Paid Sick Leave law.  Following these amendments, the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP) published updated notices and FAQ documents, but stopped short of publishing formal updates to the corresponding ESSTA Rules – until now.