Employers in Ontario are increasingly requiring employees to make more frequent appearances at the office after years of remote or hybrid work. Have courts provided any recent guidance on whether return-to-office (“RTO”) mandates may constitute constructive dismissal? What instructive findings can employers take away from these decisions as they recalibrate their workplace models? This article provides a refresher on the constructive dismissal doctrine and explores developments on permissible RTO measures.
The case law illustrates that courts are resolving RTO disputes by applying the constructive dismissal framework from the Supreme Court of Canada’s decisions in Farber v. Royal Trust Co, [1997] 1 SCR 846 and Potter v. New Brunswick Legal Aid Services Commission, 2015 SCC 10, to the realities of the modern workplace. Two Ontario decisions, Hagholm v. Coreio Innc., 2017 ONSC 7713, and Byrd v. Welcome Home Children’s Residence Inc., 2024 CarswellOnt 21744 (Ont Sup Ct J, Small Claims), explain how remote or hybrid work can be an essential term of employment, whether by express agreement or through consistent practice. These cases further demonstrate that employers who unilaterally revoke such arrangements without reasonable notice risk constructive dismissal of affected employees. Cases reviewed in other Canadian common law jurisdictions reinforce a similar principle.