Has been convicted of having forbidden to a jew to work on Saturday

Photo Marie-Ève Dumont
Richard Zilberg argues that it must build up gradually a new customer in another hair salon in Montreal.

Marie-Eve Dumont

Thursday, 13 July, 2017 23:04

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Thursday, 13 July, 2017 23:04

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The owner of a hairdressing salon has been ordered to pay $ 12,500 to one of its stylists to him have forbidden to work on Saturdays because he is jewish, has decided the Court of human rights.

“I’m happy and relieved since I won the battle after five years. This is not a simple story of a jew against another jew, I have experienced discrimination and I am held upright. It was unacceptable to restrict my working days “, says Richard Zilberg.

Mr. Zilberg was working as a hairdresser six days a week at the Spa Orazen, become Spa Liv zen, in Montreal.

In the spring of 2012, the owner of the salon, Iris Gressy, he proposed to stop work on the sabbath, to observe the sabbath (day of rest) in the jewish religion.

Although Mr. Zilberg sustain love for his religion and be proud of it, he preferred to work on Saturdays, the day the most busy of the week.

Finally, in July of the same year, his patron, who also is jewish, was informed that due to its new policy, all jewish employees could not work on Saturdays.

Employees who are not jews continued all the same to take care of the customers that day. Mrs. Gressy had also formally defended Mr. Zilberg to tell its customers what were the actual reasons of his absence.

“The decision to ban Mr. Zilberg’s work on the sabbath because he is a jew violates her right to equal employment because of his religion,” wrote the judge Yvan Nolet Court of human rights in its decision rendered on 27 June last.

“In the street “

A month later, Mr. Zilberg has finally been fired by Mrs. Gressy. She had learned that he would have advised a client that he had not the right to work the Saturday because he was a jew. She would have ordered from on-the-field, preventing him from leaving with his equipment and the details of its customers on a regular basis.

“It took me my bread, she put me on the street because I was not the kind of jew she would have wanted me to be “, let fall the hair salon.

Mr. Zilberg has been able to recover her instruments of hair, but never his customer, he attempts to rebuild his new job in a salon Carré Décarie in Montreal.

Discrimination

The Commission of human rights and the rights of the youth who represented Mr. Zilberg in this folder welcomed the decision.

“This judgment reminds us that an employer may not impose conditions of employment to an employee based on his religion, one of the grounds of discrimination prohibited by the Charter of rights and freedoms of the person “, said the president of the Commission, Me Tamara Thermitus.

The Journal was unable to reach Mrs. Gressy Thursday, neither at his residence nor at his salon which is now closed. Moreover, it is not coming to defend himself and had no lawyer to represent them at the hearings, we read in the judgment.