Business Law: Duty to Accommodate in Employment

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28 November 2018

BUSINESS LAW 1
The answer to Question 1
In the given scenario, the nail technician of the spa is undergoing illness of cancer.
She shares her concern in the form of the use of certain chemicals thereby resulting in nausea
and psychological impacts on her health. In addition, she is concerned about her deteriorating
physical illness, which is proving to be hindrances in the fulfilment of her professional duties.
The employment law issues involved in the given scenario are mainly concerned
around the human rights as defined in the Alberta Human Rights Act (AHR Act). The act
recognizes the equality of the employees on the lines of the duties, responsibilities, and the
dignity, irrespective of the physical disabilities, mental disabilities, colour, race, age, gender,
marital status, the source of income, and more (AHRC, 2018). The act recognizes cancer as a
physical disability, in addition to other diseases such as heart conditions, drug dependence,
and many more.
The technician is willing to keep her job, which is proving not to be feasible from the
business point of view. However, it would be illegal on the part of the employer to
discriminate the technician employee based on cancer. Thus, if the employer chooses to
terminate or lay off the employee on above-mentioned grounds of disability, sever legal
liabilities may be incurred (Adams, 2016). It is significant to note that even if there were a
presence of the legitimate business reasons, such as non-fulfilment of the professional duties,
still if the decision is even slightest based on cancer, it would be regarded as discrimination.
In addition, the Alberta Human Rights Act recognizes the provision of the
accommodation, whereby some changes are introduced in the rules, workplace cultures,
physical environments and more to ensure the non-occurrence of the negative impacts on a
person‘s disability in terms of the mental or physical illness. Thus, in the circumstances like