Four major teachers' unions are already challenging the legislation in court.
The law caps all public sector salary increases at one per cent per year for the next three years. Treasury Board President Peter Bethlenfalvy said he is confident the law is constitutional, and that the alternative to limiting wage increases is layoffs or tax hikes.
“It supports our ongoing efforts to restore the province to a position of fiscal health and demonstrate respect for taxpayers’ dollars,” Bethlenfalvy said in a statement. But the unions say the government should not be balancing its budget on the backs of front-line workers, particularly when it spends $231 million to cancel green energy contracts and voted to increase their own housing allowances by 20 per cent.
“No one believes that the caring for your parents or grandparents in long-term care facilities, or educational assistants or custodians at your children’s school, the teaching assistant or food service worker at your university, or the community social service worker in developmental services, or working to protect vulnerable children and families caused the deficit of the province of Ontario,” Hahn said.
The court ruled that the government “substantially interfered with meaningful collective bargaining” and Ontario was left having to pay more than $100 million in remedies to the unions.This report by The Canadian Press was first published on Dec. 17, 2019.
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