Employees are required to disclose confidential medical information for accommodation purposes.

A recent Ontario arbitral award is reshaping the way employers and employees must approach the legal duty to accommodate employees with disabilities in the workplace. Entrenched in both federal and provincial human rights legislation, the duty to accommodate imposes a legal obligation on employers to accommodate employees with disabilities unless such accommodation would cause undue hardship on the part of the employer. In Complex Services Inc. v. Ontario Public Service Employees Union [Complex Services],1 released earlier this year, a board of arbitration opined that the duty to accommodate also requires employees to disclose confidential medical information regarding their disability to employers in order to help facilitate the accommodation process.