Adoption and Coming into Force of the Act to Amend the Act Respecting Labour Standards

As this development received little media coverage, we would like to draw your attention to the fact that various amendments to the Act respecting labour standards were adopted on June 12 by Quebec’s National Assembly. Few amendments of any significance were added since Bill 176 was tabled in March of this year. We refer you in that regard to the article published at that time by Geneviève Beaudin, Marianne Plamondon and Georges Samoisette Fournier.

Several provisions new of the Act came into force the day it was adopted, particularly those dealing with differences in treatment in connection with pension plans and other benefits [s. 32].

Some other provisions however, particularly that providing that an employee credited with three years of uninterrupted service is now entitled to annual leave of three consecutive weeks [s. 11], will not take effect until January 1, 2019 [s. 47(1)].

Finally, the provisions applicable to personnel placement agencies that prohibit them from remunerating employees at a lower rate than that paid to employees of the client enterprise performing the same tasks, will come into force on the same date as the initial regulation promulgated for the purpose of applying the new provisions of the Act respecting labour standards.

Written in collaboration with Sarah Zorko, articling student.