3. Find out about domestic or sexual violence leave
Question and answer
Can I take time off work for emergencies other than sickness?You may be able to take a leave if you or your child, who's 17 years old or younger, has:
- experienced domestic or sexual violence
- been threatened with domestic or sexual violence
Your child includes a stepchild, foster child, and a child you're the legal guardian of.
To get domestic or sexual violence leave, you must have worked for your employer for at least 13 weeks in a row.
How long you can take
There are 2 lengths of domestic or sexual violence leave that you may be able to take each calendar year. One lets you take one or more days off at a time. And the other lets you take time off in periods of weeks.
This means that you may be able to take:
- up to 10 days, and
- up to 15 weeks.
Your employer can count part of a day that you take off as a full day. And they can count part of a week out of the 15 weeks as a full week.
A calendar year goes from January 1 to December 31. But you can take the full domestic or sexual violence leave even if you started working for your employer partway through the year.
When you can get this leave
You can take domestic or sexual violence leave only if you or your child needs to:
- get medical care because the violence caused a physical or psychological injury or
- get help from a victim services organization
- get professional counselling
- move, even for a short time
- deal with the police or the legal system because of the violence
Getting paid
If you take part of a day off as domestic or sexual violence leave, your employer must pay you your for the hours you worked.
And the says that you have the right to be paid for the first 5 days of domestic or sexual violence leave each year.
Proving you need a leave
Your employer can require you to prove that you need domestic or sexual violence leave. But they can only ask you for proof that's “reasonable in the circumstances”.
What's reasonable depends on things like:
- why you need the leave
- how long you need the leave to be
- any past leaves you've had or periods you've been away from work
- whether you can get proof of why you need the leave and how much it would cost