An employee may exercise a recourse if he is dismissed, suspended, transferred, if the employer practices discrimination against him or takes reprisals against him or if the employer imposes any other sanction by reason of one of the nine grounds mentioned in section 122 ALS. The reinstatement as well as an indemnity equivalent to the wages and other benefits that the employee was deprived of by the sanction can be granted if the recourse is upheld.
On May 1, 2003, the Act added a new reason under the protection of section 122 ALS. The employee is protected in the case where the employer wants to take action due to an inquiry made by the Commission in one of the employer’s establishments.

Moreover, the protection granted to the employee in relation to the refusal to work beyond his regular working hours for obligations related to care, health or education is no longer limited to a minor child. Indeed, this refusal extends to his child, whether or not he is a minor, to the child of his spouse or by reason of the state of health of his close relatives. The employee must have taken the reasonable means at his disposal to assume his parental or family obligations otherwise.

Moreover, the right of an employee to be absent owing to sickness, accident or criminal offence is now stipulated in Division V.0.1 of the Act (see the interpretation of sections 79.1 to 79.6 ALS). In this case, the condition required by the legislator in the application of presumption (see section 123.4 ALS) is the absence motivated by reason of sickness and not necessarily the proof of such sickness. The employee who exercises this right benefits from protection regarding the aforementioned sanctions by way of the recourse stipulated in paragraph 1) of section 122 ALS.

Three situations constitute a “wrongful act”:

1. Violation of a federal or Québec legislative provision or a regulation made under such a law, if it involves corruption, embezzlement, collusion, fraud or infl uence peddling, among other things, the awarding of a contract, the obtainment or execution of contracts awarded in the course of an organization’s duties or a person from the public sector;
2. Abuse of public funds or property or severe contract mismanagement in the public sector;
3. Ordering or advising a person to commit a wrongful act as defi ned in paragraphs 1 and 2.

Sanctions

Dismissal occurs when the employer terminates an employee’s employment. This term must be interpreted broadly to include layoffs, the non-renewal of a working contract in the case of a renewable contract, non-recall to work, indefinite suspension, etc.
A suspension consists of temporarily interrupting the employee’s employment for a specified period, without severing his contract of employment. The employee is deprived of his employment and his wages for that period. This is generally a disciplinary sanction.
The transfer of an employee corresponds to a change in working conditions. The employee may be assigned to another position or another work place, for instance, or receive a significant reduction in the number of work hours, a reduction in wages, a substantial modification of his duties, a reduction in the level of responsibility, etc.
Protection is generally extended to reprisals, discriminatory practices and any other penalty that an employer is likely to impose on an employee for the reasons set out in section 122 ALS. These concepts therefore cover any change in the scope of work or working conditions of an employee and any measure of retaliation taken by the employer against an employee for any of the reasons mentioned in section 122 ALS.
The procedure to exercise such recourse is provided in sections 123 ALS and following.