[00:00:00]

Ches Crosbie
Thank you everyone. We’re going to resume the proceedings. The next witness is Sabrina McGrath. And Ms. McGrath, do you affirm that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Sabrina McGrath
I do.

Ches Crosbie
Thank you.

Nicolle Snow
Good afternoon, Ms. McGrath.

Sabrina McGrath
Hello.

Nicolle Snow
Ms. McGrath, I understand you’re here today to testify with respect to the loss of your employment due to provincial COVID mandates.

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
Okay, where were you working?
Sabrina McGrath
Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation [NSLC].

Nicolle Snow
All right. And that’s a provincial government job?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
And what were you doing there?

Sabrina McGrath
I was manager for the last three years. And three years previous to that—or two years previous to that—I was assistant manager.

Nicolle Snow
Okay, and were you represented by a union?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
Did your collective agreement provide for any sort of vaccination status as part of the terms of your employment?

Sabrina McGrath
No.

Nicolle Snow
And what position? Sorry, you indicated you were a manager. Were you a valued employee for the Liquor Commission?

Sabrina McGrath
I was. Just the year previous to being placed on unpaid leave, my store had won top-performing store, so it recognizes overall sale results in leadership

Nicolle Snow
And that reflects on you as manager of the store?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes

Nicolle Snow
All right. And any anything else with respect to your value to the store you were working for?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes, I received model performance on my latest PA, performance appraisal, which is a very rare— It’s very rare to get that because I just don’t give them out to just anybody. I did a pretty good job to get it.

Nicolle Snow
Nice. And so, what year did you have that, the model performance?

Sabrina McGrath
2021.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. What mandates and protocols did the Nova Scotia Liquor Commission adopt?

Sabrina McGrath
We did masking, Plexi[glass], six feet distance, and then the latest was the vaccine mandate.

Nicolle Snow
And when was the vaccine mandate brought in?

Sabrina McGrath
We knew about it in October, but it was implemented January 15th.

Nicolle Snow
In October, they delivered the message to the employees, but it was going to be effective January 15, 2022?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes, for current employees. Anyone that was new to the corporation had to be done by November the 1st.

Nicolle Snow
It had to be done, meaning—

Sabrina McGrath
Fully vaccinated.

Nicolle Snow
All right. And were they required to show proof of that?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes, there’s a declaration form that had to be filled out.

Nicolle Snow
And with respect to the deadline of January 15, 2022 for the existing employees, was proof required?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
And what was going to happen if proof was not required? I’m sorry, I phrased that wrong: What was going to happen if proof was not provided?

Sabrina McGrath
People would be placed on an unpaid leave of absence.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. Was the adoption of this vaccination mandate contrary to some of the earlier views held by the employer?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
In what way?

Sabrina McGrath
Well, in May of 2021, there was an occupational health and safety meeting. And at that meeting, vaccinations were brought up. And the response was vaccination is not required by law. It is an individual choice. Therefore, employees are not required to be vaccinated to be in the workplace.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And were you reading from the minutes from that meeting?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
All right. And, those minutes have been delivered for filing as an exhibit, but we don’t have an exhibit number yet [Exhibit TR-22d]. How did you feel about the vaccination mandate?

Sabrina McGrath
I was 100 per cent against a vaccination mandate. I think everyone should have the choice as to what they put in their body, and it shouldn’t be a choice as to keeping your bodily integrity or losing your job.

Nicolle Snow
And so how, if at all, did the environment in your workplace change after the vaccination mandate was announced?

Sabrina McGrath
We recently had a new regional manager, Kim Jackman, and she came into the store about the first of November. And we had a cut-out of Dana White—he’s a UFC [Ultimate Fighting Championship] person—promoting his new liqueur. When she came in and she seen it—a lot of stores had it, it wasn’t just our store—she demanded we take it down immediately because he was anti-vaxx.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And was there anything on the poster that was related to vaccinations?

Sabrina McGrath
Just a picture of him. That’s all.

Nicolle Snow
And he was promoting his own product, his own product liqueur.

Sabrina McGrath
Yeah.

Nicolle Snow
Anything else?

Sabrina McGrath
Yeah, that same regional manager—it was 7 o’clock on a Friday—she came flying into the store. And she was being aggressive because she had reports that we had anti-vaxx propaganda up in the store.

[00:05:00]

Which we absolutely did not. But she went through the store with a fine-tooth comb. Didn’t find anything but she made us take a poster that we had up at the front of the store down. It was handmade by our team. It was just telling the pouring amounts, the proper pouring amounts, but it said “Cheers to Pour Choices” on it. So that’s what she had us take down, just in case that’s what people were complaining about.

Nicolle Snow
Okay, and so the “Cheers to Pour Choices” was with respect to the portion amount that you might be consuming of alcohol.

Sabrina McGrath
Right. Because we want to be socially responsible and making sure that people are ingesting the right pouring amounts.

Nicolle Snow
All right. Anything else?

Sabrina McGrath
Yeah, I was having a conversation with an employee from another store on LinkedIn, and he wrote a comment—because we have been discussing the mandates and things like that. He wrote a comment to me saying, “I thought you were leading your store to becoming fully vaccinated, not becoming fully unemployed.”

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And that was in the context of some conversation you were having with him about the mandates?

Sabrina McGrath
Right. Yeah. And then he deleted me.

Nicolle Snow
And then what?

Sabrina McGrath
He deleted me.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. Did you acquiesce to the mandate to vaccinate?

Sabrina McGrath
What’s that?
Nicolle Snow
Did you go ahead and vaccinate due to the mandate?

Sabrina McGrath
No. No, I did not.

Nicolle Snow
And what happened as a result?

Sabrina McGrath
I was placed on unpaid leave.

Nicolle Snow
And when did that happen?

Sabrina McGrath
January of 2022.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. Did you ever go back to the Nova Scotia Liquor Commission?

Sabrina McGrath
No, we had the option of going back in May on the contingency that we fill out a vaccination declaration form.

Nicolle Snow
All right. Tell us about that form.

Sabrina McGrath
It’s just a form to say whether or not we were vaccinated. They still wanted to know. We could go back into the workplace being unvaccinated, but they wanted to know whether or not we were. So we still had to attest to our status.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. So at that point the mandate to vaccinate had been lifted in the store?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes.

Nicolle Snow
Had it been lifted generally in the province?
Sabrina McGrath
It had been lifted in the province seven weeks before. The NSLC extended theirs for another seven weeks.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. During that period you were off—you said from January 2022 through to May—did you have any other source of income?

Sabrina McGrath
No.

Nicolle Snow
And did you apply for EI, employment insurance?

Sabrina McGrath
Yes, yes, I did.

Nicolle Snow
What happened with that?

Sabrina McGrath
I was denied.

Nicolle Snow
On what basis?

Sabrina McGrath
Service Canada deemed it as misconduct.

Nicolle Snow
And what were they calling misconduct?

Sabrina McGrath
Not following the vaccination mandate.

Nicolle Snow
Did you file an ROE with Service Canada for your application?

Sabrina McGrath
Yep.

Nicolle Snow
And did the ROE say anything about misconduct?

Sabrina McGrath
No, it just said unpaid leave.

Nicolle Snow
And so, were you able to determine how someone at Service Canada found that there was misconduct related to the vaccine policy when that was not on your ROE?

Sabrina McGrath
They said they called the NSLC. And when the NSLC told them it was mandate-related, they put down misconduct.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. Did you apply for a reconsideration of that decision?

Sabrina McGrath
I did.

Nicolle Snow
And what happened?

Sabrina McGrath
Denied.

Nicolle Snow
And you have a union?

Sabrina McGrath
Yep.

Nicolle Snow
Or you did have a union. Did you go to your union at all?

Sabrina McGrath
I did. I went before the, before it was even mandated. Once we found out it was going to be mandated, I went to them right away.

Nicolle Snow
That was October 2021 when you learned about it. Okay, so you went to your union and what happened?

Sabrina McGrath
They would do nothing. They said the employer was allowed to mandate vaccinations.

Nicolle Snow
And did they base that on any particular opinions?

Sabrina McGrath
They just said case law.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And so, was there an indication that they went for legal advice or anything of that nature?

Sabrina McGrath
They said that they went to legal counsel and asked legal counsel and that’s what they said.

Nicolle Snow
And so, the determination was that they felt you would lose, so they may as well not fight it for you.

Sabrina McGrath
Yeah.

Nicolle Snow
Did you have an opportunity to see whatever legal advice was provided to the union?

Sabrina McGrath
No.

Nicolle Snow
Did you ask for it?

Sabrina McGrath
I did ask for it.

Nicolle Snow
And what happened?
Sabrina McGrath
They denied my request, saying that they don’t provide union members with that information.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. Did you bring any other grievances?

Sabrina McGrath
There was a grievance in April, but the union approached me about that grievance. It was the time period between when the government ended their mandates and the NSLC kept theirs for an additional seven weeks. The only period of time that the NSGEU [Nova Scotia Government and General Employees Union] was willing to grieve was that time period.

[00:10:00]

Nicolle Snow
And what happened with that grievance?

Sabrina McGrath
For me, I was—it was withdrawn because I was no longer working at the NSLC. So they withdrew mine, but other people got something.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And so that was for the people who were placed on leave without pay: the grievance was with respect to that short period that they should have received their pay.

Sabrina McGrath
Right. Just that seven weeks, yeah.

Nicolle Snow
By that time, you had left your employment altogether. Okay. And so, you were on leave without pay for a period of time.

Did termination happen at some point?

Sabrina McGrath
They deemed me as being resigned from my position. If I didn’t fill out the declaration form by June the 12th, I was considered to have been resigned from my position.

Nicolle Snow
Okay. And why were you opposed to filling out the declaration form?

Sabrina McGrath
Because it’s still giving out my medical information. I would have done it before if that was the case, right? There was no point in doing it that late.

Nicolle Snow
Did you take any other positive action to try to combat the mandates and your concerns?

Sabrina McGrath
I did. I emailed the Premier, Tim Houston. No response from him—even now. And I wrote my HR and a few senior VPs. I emailed them all.

Nicolle Snow
And what happened with those emails.

Sabrina McGrath
As far as the senior VPs, no response from them. HR responded within a day saying that the appropriate people would see my email. And then I received a response on January 13th, which was two days before the mandate.

Nicolle Snow
And what was the general substance of your letter to Mr. Houston?

Sabrina McGrath
Just explaining why. Why mandates shouldn’t be implemented. Especially when it comes to losing your job. A lot of people got it just to keep their job and that’s forever in them now, right? I mean, people did it to keep their job. At the end of the day, you’re still dispensable, you know. Like, you can get that to keep your job and they can still let you go, so then you would have done it for nothing.

Nicolle Snow
And the substance of your letter, your emails to HR?

Sabrina McGrath
Pretty much the same. A lot of it was copy and paste.

Nicolle Snow
OK, all right.

Nicolle Snow
You brought with you today—so there’s the minutes we referenced. You brought with you also your 2021 annual performance check. You talked about your good performance appraisal. We have that with us, which will be entered as an exhibit [Exhibit TR-22a]. You brought with you today your e-mail to Tim Houston and your termination letter from the Nova Scotia Liquor Commission. You brought with you today your response from Service Canada declining your claim and the reasons why they declined it, as well as your response from the union with respect to your grievance and your communications to HR. Is that correct?

Sabrina McGrath
Yep.

Nicolle Snow
OK. And those I believe are scanned. We don’t have exhibit numbers yet, but they will be filed. All right, those are all my questions.

Thank you for testifying. And we’ll wait a moment to see if there are any questions from the commissioners.

Sabrina McGrath
Okay.

Nicolle Snow
All right, thank you very much, Ms. McGrath. Thank you. Thank you.

Sabrina McGrath
You’re welcome. Okay.

[00:13:59]

Final Review and Approval: Jodi Bruhn, August 3, 2023.

The evidence offered in this transcript is a true and faithful record of witness testimony given during the National Citizens Inquiry (NCI) hearings. The transcript was prepared by members of a team of volunteers using an “intelligent verbatim” transcription method.

For further information on the transcription process, method, and team, see the NCI website: https://nationalcitizensinquiry.ca/about-these-transcripts/

Summary

Sabrina was a Manager at a Nova Scotia Liquor Commission store that had an exemplary employment history but was terminated due to COVID mandates.

On the deadline of January 15, 2022 proof was required that vaccination was taken or staff would be placed on unpaid leave of absence, she did not get vaccinated so she was placed on the “leave”. She applied for Employment Insurance but was denied due to “misconduct” (not taking the vaccine) despite her ROE not saying this, and her union would not help her.