Bill that targets high heels in workplace passes

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This article was published 23/05/2018 (2157 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba government has backed Opposition MLA Nahanni Fontaine’s bill to ban employers from forcing women to wear high heels in the workplace.

“It is unsafe footwear for women to be wearing in the workplace in the hospitality industry,” Fontaine said in an interview, after her private member’s bill passed third reading Thursday morning.

“It is 2018, and we should be ensuring women are safe in the workplace… and that women’s bodies are not sexualized,” the NDP MLA told the house earlier.

Legislature staff said the bill becomes law when it receives royal assent, tentatively scheduled for later this month.

Bill 219 doesn’t specifically address high heels; Fontaine’s bill prevents employers from forcing workers to wear unsafe footwear.

The government will draw up the rules and regulations for the bill’s implementation and enforcement, which will receive final approval by cabinet in an order-in-council.

Fontaine said it should be clear, while there are circumstances in which women choose to wear heels one to three inches high (2.5 to 7.5 centimetres), they are not safe footwear for entire shifts in a restaurant, especially since those workplaces often have slippery and sticky floors. Employers would not expect men to wear such footwear, she said.

However, she said, should women choose to wear high heels at work, it’s their decision.

Joey Dearborn, press secretary for government house leader Cliff Cullen, said Cullen will sort out details of scheduling royal assent with Fontaine, who is the Opposition house leader.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca