Canadian Payroll Reporter

4 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2017 Legislative Roundup July 2017 | CPR holidays, paid vacations and minimum wage. With the amendments, paid, non-family farm employees who work on a holiday will be entitled to their regular hourly rate for the hours worked, plus either holiday pay of 4.2 per cent of their previous four weeks' wages or an alternate day off with pay. They will continue to be ex- cluded from existing hours of work and overtime standards; however, they will be entitled to four days of rest every 28 days. If an employer and an employee do not agree on the date, the employer will decide on the rest days. Family members will con- tinue to be exempt from the Employment Standards Code's requirements. In addition, greenhouses, nurseries, and mushroom and sod farms will continue to not be considered farms under the code. For more details on bill 17, see the article "Alberta overhauls rules for workplace" on the front page of this issue. Saskatchewan PST will apply to insurance premiums as of August The Saskatchewan government is delaying the date that it will apply provincial sales tax (PST) to insurance premiums by one month. In the province's March 22 budget, Finance Minister Kevin Doherty said the PST would be charged on insurance premi- ums, including those for life, ac- cident and health insurance, due on or after July 1, regardless of when the insurance policy was issued. At that time, he also an- nounced that the PST rate would rise from five per cent to six per cent on March 23. In May, Doherty said the government would move the in-force date for the PST to be charged on insurance premiums to August 1, to give the insurance industry more time to imple- ment the change. He also announced further changes to ensure that the tax is applied equitably on insurance premiums. They include applying the PST to self-insured group ar- rangements (also called Admin- istrative Services Only arrange- ments), exempting the PST from individual permanent life insur- ance policies in effect before August 1, and clarifying that any endorsements added to insur- ance contracts with an effective date before August 1 would not subject to the PST. Manitoba Provincial government to begin indexing minimum wage The Manitoba government will begin indexing the province's minimum wage rate as of this October. In May, the provincial leg- islature passed legislation that will require the government to adjust the minimum wage rate every year to reflect changes in Manitoba's consumer price in- dex (CPI). Bill 33, The Minimum Wage Indexation Act (Employment Standards Code Amended), mandates that any minimum wage changes take place annu- ally on October 1, beginning this year. Starting in 2018, the govern- ment will be required to an- nounce minimum wage rate ad- justments before April 1. Minimum wage changes will be rounded to the nearest five cents. If the CPI adjustment is negative, the government will not adjust the minimum wage rate. The legislation also allows the government to freeze the minimum wage rate if economic conditions, such as a recession, warrant it. Meanwhile, Manitoba public- sector unions say they will file a court challenge against a newly imposed law from the provin- cial government that intends to freeze and cap their wages for the next four years. The bill was passed on the fi- nal day of the spring legislative session in June. Ontario Wide-ranging changes proposed for employment standards The Ontario government is proposing to make large-scale changes to the province's labour laws. Bill 148, the Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act, 2017, which La- bour Minister Kevin Flynn ta- bled in the provincial legislature on June 1, would amend the Em- ployment Standards Act, 2000 and the Labour Relations Act, 1995. The amendments are in re- sponse to the final report of the Changing Workplaces Review, which the government set up two years ago to examine the workplace laws in light of issues such as globalization, techno- logical advances, and the growth of non-standard employment and precarious work. The report recommended wide-ranging changes to both laws. The bill only incorporates some of the report's suggestions. Many of the changes would take effect Jan. 1, 2018. Among the proposed amendments: • Statutory holiday provisions would be simplified, including pay calculations. • Vacation entitlement would increase from two weeks to three weeks after five years of employment with the same employer. • Employees who hold more than one position with an employer and who work over- time would be paid at the rate that applies to the position for which they are working over- time. • Employees who regularly work more than three hours a day would have to be paid at least three hours at their regular rate if, upon reporting to work, they are given fewer than three hours of work. • Employees would be allowed to refuse shifts without reper- cussions if their employer gave them fewer than four days' no- tice. If an employer cancelled a shift within 48 hours of its start, it would have to pay the employees three hours at their regular rate of pay. • Employees who have been em- ployed by their employer for at least three months would have the right to request schedule or location changes, without fear of reprisal. • The general minimum wage rate would rise to $15 an hour on Jan. 1, 2019. The change would be phased-in, with the rate increasing to $11.60 on October 1 (as previously an- nounced) and to $14 on Jan. 1, 2018. • The government would main- tain separate minimum wage rates for liquor servers, stu- dents under 18, hunting and fishing guides and home work- ers, although the rates would go up by the same percentage as the general minimum wage. • The labour ministry would have the authority to prescribe additional methods for pay- ing employees beyond cash, cheque or direct deposit. • A 50-employee threshold for entitlement to personal emer- gency leave would be elimi- nated. All employees would be entitled to 10 days of personal emergency leave per year, with two of the days being paid days. The reasons for taking the leave would be expanded to include domestic or sexual violence. • The maximum length of fam- ily medical leave would in- crease from eight weeks in a 26-week period to 27 weeks in a 52-week period. • Employees would be allowed to take up to 104 weeks off work if their child died from any cause. • The amount of time off an em- ployee could take for a child's crime-related disappearance would increase from 52 weeks to 104 weeks. • Casual, part-time, temporary and seasonal employees would have to be paid equally to full- time staff when doing the same job, with exceptions for factors such as a seniority system, a merit system, or a system that measures earnings by quantity or quality of production. • Penalties for non-compliance would increase. Flynn also said the Labour Ministry would hire up to 175 more employment standards officers by 2020-2021 to inspect more workplaces and resolve claims more quickly. from FARMERS on page 1

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