Ontario hospital workers are set to get additional wage increases over two years, the latest in a series of similar arbitration decisions after the province's wage-restraint law was found unconstitutional.
An arbitrator has awarded 3.75 per cent and 2.5 per cent for last year and this year to hospital workers such as dietary aides, personal support workers and registered practical nurses on top of the one per cent per year they received under the law known as Bill 124.
That 2019 law limited wage increases for broader public sector workers to one per cent a year for three years, but was declared unconstitutional late last year by an Ontario court.
The government has appealed that ruling, with hearings set for later this month, but in the meantime, the Canadian Union of Public Employees and the SEIU Healthcare union are the latest of those affected by the law to have successfully argued in arbitration for more money.
Arbitrator William Kaplan said in a decision this week that the best comparators for wage increases that would have been freely collectively bargained during the 2022 and 2023 time period are the 4.75 per cent and 3.5 per cent, respectively, that both Ontario power workers and federal public service employees achieved.
Kaplan also awarded an additional $2 to the predominant hourly rate for registered practical nurses and increases to shift and weekend premiums as well as some benefits. Registered nurses, who got pay boosts in a separate decision, were not...
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