Halifax flip-flops on mandatory vaccines for employees

HALIFAX -

Halifax Regional Municipality is flip-flopping on its vaccine mandate policy.

Come mid-December, city employees will have to be vaccinated.

"Any municipal employees who are not fully vaccinated by Dec. 15, provided they don't have an employer-approved exemption, may face employment consequences up to and including administrative unpaid leave," said HRM public affairs advisor Laura Wright.

This affects approximately 4,000 workers including police, firefighters and transit workers. Earlier this week the city said it would not bring in this rule.

"The decision has been made to reassess and we have decided to take steps to implement the mandatory vaccination policy," Wright said.

"I call it a reaction instead of a proaction," said Ken Wilson, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 508.

While Wilson supports the move, he knows a minority of transit drivers will not.

He questions the timing.

The HRM's announcement comes one day after Ottawa mandated vaccines for all federal workers and Nova Scotia did the same for provincial workers.

"It's a reaction to the province's statement for mandatory vaccinations for their staff," Wilson said.

Nan McFadgen, president of CUPE Nova Scotia, believes the mixed messaging signals uncertainty from the HRM. CUPE represents about 350 city employees—including snow-plow drivers and parks and recreation workers.

"We're hearing from members who are like 'thank goodness, you know everyone is going to be vaccinated so my entire workplace is going to be vaccinated, I'll feel so much safer,'" McFadgen said. "And we have heard from some members who are telling us they are going to leave their employment."

McFadgen said some members are asking whether vaccine mandates can be done.

Wayne MacKay, Professor Emeritus of Law at Dalhousie University, said it probably can.

"You can never give a categorical answer precisely on the facts of each case, but I do think a lot of people that are claiming that their rights are clearly violated are not looking at all the details -- and in particular they're not looking at the fact that all our rights in the Charter are not absolute but subject to reasonable limits in a free and democratic society," he said.

"Employers have pretty broad powers to impose this kind of thing during the pandemic. Very important it's not a permanent thing but during the pandemic. But during the pandemic when there is such a high risk and especially with the Delta variant," MacKay said.