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Ontario’s Pay Equity Act

with Selected Case References, 2022

Disclaimer: This Guide gives an overview of the minimum requirements of the Pay Equity Act as interpreted by the Pay Equity Office. The interpretations are drawn from our own experiences and by applying the key rulings of the Pay Equity Hearings Tribunal and the courts and is current to the date ​of publication.

Purpose

In this section

4. (1) The purpose of this Act is to redress systemic gender discrimination in compensation for work performed by employees in female job classes

 

Ontario Nurses Association v. Haldimand-Norfolk (Regional Municipality) (No.3), 1989 CanLII 1454 (ON PEHT) 1989-06-30 — The parties disputed the identity of the employer and so asked the Tribunal to make a determination. In their interpretation, the Tribunal noted that the Act has elements of both human rights and labour relations law. Employment and labour relations case law may be helpful in interpreting the Act, such as in the case of interpreting “employer” in the absence of a definition, but only to the extent that such is in accordance with the purpose sand structure of the Act.

Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 1999 v. Lakeridge Health Corporation, 2010 CanLII 46187 (ON PEHT) 2010-08-11 — The Tribunal refused an application asking them to adjust the wage grids of female job classes to mirror those of male classes. The Tribunal specified that the purpose of the Act is to redress, rather than “eliminate” gender discrimination in compensation in accordance with the detailed provisions of the legislative scheme. The legislature made a number of choices about how pay equity is to be achieved, with the consideration that that the Act does not contemplate the elimination of all discrepancies between comparably-valued male and female job classes. As such, the Tribunal has no authority to deal with complaints of sex discrimination under the Human Rights Code unrelated to the implementation of pay equity. The Act it is a highly specialized and integrative undertaking blending aspects of labour relations, compensation practices, employment law and human rights.

York Region District School Board v. Canadian Union of Public Employees [2011] O.P.E.D. No. 36 — The Tribunal refused an application asking them to adjust the wage grids of female job classes to mirror those of male classes. At para. 43, it is noted that this provision must be considered in the context of the statute as a whole. There are statutory provisions conferring on a tribunal the jurisdiction to determine if gender discrimination in pay exists and leaving completely to the tribunal’s discretion the question of how that should be redressed. There are also many provisions in the Act that specifically address how discrimination is to be redressed. Where the Act is not silent, the Tribunal does not have freestanding jurisdiction as to how to redress gender discrimination.

Identification of systemic gender discrimination

(2) Systemic gender discrimination in compensation shall be identified by undertaking comparisons between each female job class in an establishment and the male job classes in the establishment in terms of compensation and in terms of the value of the work performed. R.S.O. 1990, c. P.7, s. 4.

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