I just saw this announced on the news today. Since the Ministry of Labour is bringing the charges, presumably they are under the Occupational Health and Safety Act, (OHSA).
The OHSA and its regulations are quite complex, but essentially a workplace and specifically those in any level of management in the company controlling the workplace, have a duty to provide a safe workplace for staff.
You can anticipate the defence that will be used, which will be “we did the best that we could with the chaos enveloping us and our industry and the limited options that we had.”
What will be most interesting about this case and the others that will follow it, are the effects they will have on a going forward basis for the next viral outbreak- anyone remember SARS from early this century?
This brings up another question that gets raised from time to time and then forgotten, and that is, should Justices of the Peace, who hear the OHSA trials in Provincial Offences Court, have to be trained lawyers? Many folk, who are not trained lawyers, but have had significant community involvement, have been appointed as Justices of the Peace by provincial governments of various stripes.
Given that some provincial offence prosecutions can lead to jail sentences, it seems to me time to insist that Justice of the Peace appointments come from trained lawyers only.
In criminal court, all judges were originally litigation lawyers.