The Continuing Divide Over Stress Leave
(Tuesday June 14th, 2005)

A blue-ribbon panel on mental health yesterday slammed Conservative MP Gurmant Grewal's decision to take a stress leave with pay and without apparent medical support as a setback that will deepen skepticism about legitimate and rising stress issues in the workplace.

"I'm livid because this is just morally wrong. The average person doesn't have the ability to go to his boss and say 'the pressure is too high, I'm going home,' " says Bill Wilkerson, CEO of the non-profit Global Business and Economic Roundtable on Addiction and Mental Health.

"It doesn't happen in the real world, where there are a lot of people facing skepticism over legitimate workplace stress that can lead to illness," he adds.

The roundtable recommends the creation of a clear definition of chronic stress and clear rules that define when such stress becomes a condition that merits a leave of absence from work. That comes at a time when there is no such definition or rules in work legislation in Canada and employers remain divided about its legitimacy, fear abuse and handle stress leaves in a variety of ways. That's the case even as stress is recognized as an increasing problem in the workplace, requests for stress leaves are skyrocketing and stress-related illness is costing employers billions of dollars every year. To read more, click here.

Source: Wallace Immen, The Globe & Mail, June 10, 2005