Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource
The Pay Equity Office is pleased to offer a new resource for compensation specialists, unions, legal professionals, and others who are interested in learning more about pay equity law in Ontario.
The Selected Case Reference Guide is an annotated version of the Pay Equity Act with a curated selection of relevant tribunal and court caselaw presented alongside the section of the Act that it applies to.
Each selection is presented as a short synopsis of the case’s precedent with a link to the source decision on www.CanLii.org. Readers can look up key cases either by browsing to the section of the Act you’re interested in, or by using the Case Index at the end of the Guide.
“We are pleased to offer this valuable new resource to support pay equity practitioners in their understanding of the Pay Equity Act and relevant caselaw”, said Kadie Ward, Commissioner and Chief Administrative Officer of the PEO. “This guide will serve as an efficient reference tool to support employers create their pay equity plans in accordance with the Act.”
This Guide is a living document and will be updated from time to time. We welcome your feedback on the Guide – please send your comments to AskPayEquity@ontario.ca.
- Read Ontario’s Pay Equity Act with Selected Case References.
- Follow the Pay Equity Office on LinkedIn and Twitter for all the latest news and resources.
Also reported in:
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource (newswire.ca), January 2023.
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office releases new reference guide for employers, compensation specialists, (January 2023), Talent Canada
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource (yahoo.com), (January 2023), Yahoo Finance
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource, Municipal News, The Canadian Business Journal (cbj.ca), (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource | Canadian Insider, (January 2023)
Tolerance.ca, (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource, L’annonceur | Fil de nouvelles CNW (lannonceur.ca), (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource, News Updates – Tdot Women Magazine, (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource, News Updates – BizReflections, (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource – Benzinga, (January 2023)
Ontario’s Pay Equity Office Launches New Legal Resource, PR Newswire | One News Page, (January 2023)
Business News You Need To Know | Trending News – Run The Money, (January 2023)
Ontario’s Office of Pay Equity introduces new legal resources – Ontario News (canadatoday.news), (January 2023)
New resource on Pay Equity Act takes case law into account, (January 2023), Law Times
The Gender Wage Gap: Explaining the Unexplained Season Two, Level the Paying Field, Launches April 2023.
In Canada, it’s taken over 20 years to close the gender wage gap by 8%, with 70% of the gap remaining unexplained. While Ontario has had the most advanced pay equity legislation globally for the past 30 years, the gender wage gap persists and from 2016 to 2021 census data, has widened as women’s employment and economic gains are sluggish in a post-COVID labour market.
Building upon the success of season one of the award-winning podcast, Level the Paying Field, season two launches April 25th. Exploring topics related to economics, equity, women, work and wage equity, in this season of Level the Paying Field, the Pay Equity Office (PEO) of Ontario convenes leading experts and renowned researchers to uncover the hidden biases that contribute to unexplained pay gaps.
“Gender bias is pervasive in our society” says Kadie Ward, Commissioner and CAO of the Pay Equity Office. “From who does what work, to parenting, to unpaid care work, we can see gender coded expectations everywhere and these create inequalities generally and in the labour market.”
Through the series, Ontario’s Pay Equity Office seeks to highlight how data and research can seed meaningful conversations around gender inequality and drive change.
“Each of our guests have experience in researching, analysing, creating and adapting policies to help address underlying stereotypes,” says Ward. “We’ve pulled this group of experts together to uncover the invisible drivers of the gender wage gap and, more importantly, shed light on how to confront and eliminate them.”
Join the Pay Equity Office in elevating the equity conversation to make the world a more equitable place for women to work, live and thrive and support closing the gender wage gap.
Watch episodes of Level the Paying Field at www.levelthepayingfield.ca or listen wherever you download your podcasts.
Quick Facts:
- Level the Paying Field is a six-part video series and podcast series covering topics related to economics, equity, women, work and money and explore the gender wage gap.
- In 2022 the podcast was recognized with a Gold Quill Award of Merit from the International Assocation of Business Communicators
- Level the Paying Field ranked in the top 100 podcasts in the Careers category in Canada.
- The gender wage gap (GWG) is the difference between wages earned by men and wages earned by women. There are different ways to measure the GWG.
- In Ontario, the GWG calculated on the basis of average hourly wages is 13%. This means that for every $1.00 earned by a male worker, a female worker earns 87 cents. Calculated using average annual salary earnings, the GWG is 25%, or 75 cents on the dollar. The gap is even wider for Indigenous women who earn 61 cents on the dollar, and racialized women who earn 62 cents.
- Globally, calculated on the basis of average hourly wages, the GWG remains at 18.8%, ranging from 12.6% in low-income countries to 29% in upper middle-income countries.
67e session de la Commission de la condition de la femme de l’Organisation des Nations unies (CCFNU 67)
La commissaire Ward participé à la 67e session de la Commission de la condition de la femme de l’Organisation des Nations unies (CCFNU 67) pour discuter de l’intégration des femmes et d’autres groupes marginalisés dans le domaine de la technologie. L’ajout de voix diverses à ce secteur en pleine croissance donne lieu à des solutions plus créatives et offre un plus grand potentiel d’innovations qui répondent aux besoins des femmes et qui favorisent l’égalité des genres.
67th Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)
Commissioner Ward attended the 67th Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) to discuss bringing women and other marginalized groups into technology. Adding diverse voices to this growing sector results in more creative solutions and has greater potential for innovations that meet women’s needs and promote gender equality.
Economic Developers Council of Ontario (EDCO)
La commissaire Ward était ravie de se joindre à Sara Bentham et Dior Sarr pour parler avec Economic Developers Council of Ontario (EDCO) sur l’obstacles auxquels sont confrontées les femmes qui travaillent et l’importance de combler l’écart salarial entre les sexes.
Economic Developers Council of Ontario (EDCO)
Commissioner Ward was excited to join Sara Bentham and Dior Sarr to speak with Economic Developers Council of Ontario (EDCO) on the barriers facing working women and the importance of closing the gender wage gap.
Séance d’échange d’idées organisée par Women’s Collective du Globe & Mail
La commissaire Ward était ravie de participer à la séance d’échange d’idées organisée par Women’s Collective du Globe & Mail, PANDC (personnes autochtones, noires et de couleur) Femmes au travail – Surmonter les obstacles à l’avancement. La progression des femmes vers les cadres dirigeants est généralement plus longue et tortueuse que celle des hommes, mais ces difficultés sont considérablement amplifiées pour les femmes noires, les femmes indigènes et les autres femmes de couleur. La séance avait pour but de réfléchir à la manière dont les organisations peuvent accroître la représentation des PANDC à tous les niveaux de leadership.
Globe & Mail’s Women’s Collective Idea Exchange
Commissioner Ward was excited to participate in the Globe & Mail’s Women’s Collective Idea Exchange session BIPOC Women at Work – Overcoming barriers to advancement. Women typically experience a longer and more circuitous rise to the C-suite than men, but these challenges are significantly amplified for Black women, Indigenous women and other women of colour. The session aimed to reflect on how organizations can increase BIPOC representation across leadership levels.
