The Ontario NDP is making a major commitment to the lowest earning workers in the province.
Party Leader Andrea Horwath promised on Tuesday, if elected next June, her party would boost minimum wage to $20 an hour over a five year period. Under the proposed NDP plan, minimum wage would rise to $16 per hour on Oct. 1, 2022, $17 per hour on May 1, 2023, $18 per hour on May 1 2024, $19 per hour on May 1, 2025, and finally $20 per hour on May 1, 2026.
"The price of everything is going up – from gas to housing to hydro bills — and with Doug Ford’s low-wage policy, everyone is feeling the squeeze. Minimum wage earners are working their tails off and still can’t get ahead of the bills. They make sacrifices to buy the necessities for the kids, and often pick up a second or even third job to make ends meet,” said Horwath.
She stated that the regularly scheduled increases will allow local businesses a "stable, predictable path" to prepare for the pay increases. The NDP would also create a fund to help struggling small and medium sized businesses, farms, and agribusinesses transition to the higher hourly wages.
Earlier this month, the Ford government announced it would raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour in the new year. The move would see a full-time worker making general minimum wage earn an extra $1,350 annually. Other political parties and labour groups however, criticized the Ford government’s proposed pay hike, noting it is not high enough to counter the current cost of living.
After being elected in 2018, Ford scrapped a plan by the previous Liberal government that would have increased minimum wage to $15 an hour the following year. His government kept the hourly minimum wage frozen at $14 until October 2020 when it went up by 25 cents per hour. It went up by another 10 cents this past October to $14.35.
Ontarians go to the polls on June 2, 2022.
