The B.C. NDP government’s pay-transparency legislation, introduced Tuesday, won’t do enough to close the gender wage gap, according to a coalition of 125 B.C. organizations, academics and advocates.
Advocates, legal experts and the B.C. Greens are pushing instead for pay-equity legislation that would require employers to guarantee the right to equitable pay and give the government more enforcement powers.
Kelli Paddon, B.C.’s parliamentary secretary for gender equity, said the legislation is an important first step to building a system of pay equity in B.C.
Speaking the day before International Women’s Day on Wednesday, Paddon said once the legislation passes, all employers will be required starting Nov. 1 to include wage or salary ranges on all publicly advertised jobs. B.C. employers will gradually be required to make public reports on their gender pay gap.
Currently, only public sector companies are required to publish a so-called “sunshine list” of employees who make $75,000 a year or more.
The Vancouver Sun in December published a searchable database with salary information for nearly 125,000 public servants in B.C. earning at least $75,000, including those working in government, health care, policing and education. Postmedia’s research showed that more than half of public sector employees are women but 72 per cent of the top 100 wage earners are men.
The requirement for pay equity...
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