FAQ's Cases - Stewart McKelvey

- 9 -who, the plaintiff said, were rarely there 10 minutes early but were either not spoken to or werenot reprimanded as severely.[43] More generally, the plaintiff’s evidence was that she felt that she was not treated as wellas the other employees. The evidence of Leyda (Bonnie) Wills and Tina Kennedy agreed withthis assessment.[44] Ms. Wills’ evidence was that the plaintiff was treated badly by the Pozniaks, as a secondclass citizen. She said that the plaintiff was verbally abused by Ms. Pozniak who would say, forexample, “What’s wrong with you?” The plaintiff would be given jobs to do with insufficienttime, and Ms. Pozniak would get furious at her for not keeping up. She added that the plaintiffknew the system, was a fast worker and would help Ms. Wills if she had time. Ms. Willsfrequently heard Ms. Pozniak being angry at the plaintiff, including over the plaintiff’s shoes ondress-down day. There was, she said, regular criticism of the plaintiff by Roberta Pozniak.2011 ONSC 2148 (CanLII)[45] Ms. Kennedy did not recall the plaintiff being treated differently from the others workwise,but noted that Ms. Pozniak had less patience with the plaintiff and picked on her a lot. Shereferred to the plaintiff “walking on eggshells” each day, some of which got worse over time.[46] Roberta Pozniak testified that Ms. Wills and Ms. Kennedy’s evidence that the plaintiffwas poorly treated was wrong, and that she treated all of the employees the same. She did wantemployees to arrive at work ten minutes early so as to be ready to work at their starting time, andhad to bring this to the attention of other employees at times. She recalled speaking with theplaintiff on one occasion about arriving late and being told that it was because the plaintiff hadbeen physically ill on the way to the office. Ms. Pozniak said she told the plaintiff to check herdesk, give her files to the others and go home, but that the plaintiff stayed and worked the day.[47] Ms. Pozniak admitted being strict about the dress code with all of the employees and saidthat she would bring it to the attention of a person not following the code. Walter Pozniak saidthat applied to him, too. She recalled telling all three employees at times that something was notacceptable and asked that they not wear it again. The business was associated with CarlsonWagonlit which had a mandatory uniform from the fall of 1995 until about 2003. After that, andafter consulting the staff, she had ordered suits for them which were worn from September toMay but replaced by business casual wear in the warmer months. She reviewed how they hadinstituted casual Fridays, but that she had maintained some standards and spoken to both DebbieSt. Pierre and the plaintiff asking them not to wear certain items again, but not sending themhome because of it.[48] Personal calls, she said, were acceptable if necessary, but were to be kept short.