Statement from MPP Mitzie Hunter, Ontario Liberal Finance Critic
The Pay Transparency Act was passed in April 2018 and was scheduled to come into force on January 1, 2019. Under the Conservative’s Bill 57, this will not happen.
Instead of the act coming into force on January 1st, they have postponed the implementation until an unidentified later date. It is this government’s way of getting rid of a strategy to address the Gender Wage Gap.
The Pay Transparency Act would have increased transparency in hiring processes and given employees more information when negotiating compensation, making Ontario the first province in Canada to do so. All publicly advertised job postings would be required to include a salary rate or range. Employers would have been barred from asking a job candidate about their past compensation. Reprisals would have been prohibited against employees, who discuss or disclose compensation, and a framework was to be established to require larger employers to track and report compensation gaps based on gender and other diversity characteristics.
The Gender Wage Gap still unfairly disadvantages women across Ontario and every other jurisdiction. In Ontario, the gap is between 12 and 29 cents, and that gap is larger for women in racialized communities, and even larger for women with disabilities. We need to close this gap and pay transparency is an important part of that.
This should not be a partisan issue and for a government that prides itself on transparency, they have given absolutely no indication as to why this should not apply to employers when discussing compensation.