What is Bill 148? Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act (Bill 148) Overview & Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) June, 2018 Bill 148, also known as the Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act, was passed by the Ontario government in November, 2017 in an effort to reduce the impact of precarious employment and create more opportunity and security for workers in this changing economy. This legislation makes a number of changes to the Employment Standards Act (ESA) and the Labour Relations Act including: SECTION CHANGE TO ESA What s New? NEW ESA REQUIREMENTS THAT IMPACT THE COLLEGE When? Effective Date Minimum Wage - Increases from $11.60/hour to $14 per hour on January 1, 2018; - Increases to $15 per hour on January 1, 2019, with annual inflation adjustment on October 1 beginning in 2019. January 1 st, 2018; and January 1 st, 2019 (adjustment October 1 st, 2019) Vacation Time and Vacation Pay The increase to the general minimum wage does not impact wage rates at or above this rate. Under the legislation, employees are now entitled to three weeks of paid vacation after five years with the same employer. Vacation Time: Employees with less than five years of employment are entitled to two weeks of vacation time after each 12- month vacation entitlement year. Employees with five or more years of employment are entitled to three weeks of vacation time. Ordinarily, a vacation entitlement year is a recurring 12-month period beginning on the date of hire. Where the employer has established an alternative vacation entitlement year that begins on a date other than the date of hire, the employee is also entitled to a pro-rated amount of vacation time for the period (called a stub period ) that precedes the alternative vacation entitlement year. Vacation Pay: Vacation pay must be at least four per cent (4%) of the gross wages (excluding any vacation pay) earned in the 12-month vacation entitlement year or stub period (where that applies) for employees with less than five years of employment. Employees with five or more years of employment at the end of a 12-month vacation entitlement year or stub period (if any) are entitled to at least six per cent (6%) of the gross wages earned in the 12-month vacation entitlement year or stub period. January 1 st, 2018
Public Holiday Pay/Statutory Holidays An employee s contract of employment or a collective agreement may provide a greater right or benefit with respect to vacation time and/or pay. Notes: 1. PT Support and PT Admin currently receives 4% vacation, which now is identified separately in their pay advice. 2. Part time, Partial Load and Sessional employee s hourly rate of pay was historically reported as inclusive of a percentage in lieu of vacation. Under the new regulations vacation pay is to be identified separately on your pay advice. As a result your pay advice now has two lines of earning information, one for your hourly rate of pay and the number of hours worked and another for vacation pay. Together your rate of pay and your vacation pay will equal the wage rates defined in your Collective Agreement or Employment Contract. 3. CE staff: We are currently working on having your vacation pay identified on a separate line on your pay advice. As Agents of the Crown, the College has historically been exempt from this section of the ESA. With the introduction of Bill 148, we are now required to issue public holiday pay when employees meet certain conditions using a prescribed formula. Since the roll out of Bill 148, the recognized public holidays have not changed, but the formula for calculating the public holiday pay has changed. The formula for calculating public holiday pay changed as of December 2017 and will change again on July 1 st, 2018. We ll provide you with detailed formulas if you re interested. Bill148questions@mohawkcollege.ca Notes for employees using web time entry: 1. Part-time employees are no longer required to key hours into the electronic timesheet on public holidays. Payroll will calculate your public holiday pay entitlement using the prescribed formula. 2. The time and attendance system should reflect the actual hours worked on each respective day. Please do not enter all hours worked in the week, on one day. For example, if you work 4 hours each day for 3 days, you need to enter them accordingly (4 hours per day in the 3 days worked), not as 12 hours on one day. For more detailed info, please see Time Entry clarification document. 3. Full-time and Part-time employees may be scheduled to work on a public holiday in areas where there is a clear business need, and where the need to work has been pre-approved by HR.(*) (*) When an employee works on a public holiday and the supervisor and employee agree to substitute a day off rather than receive public holiday pay, the supervisor must provide the January 1 st, 2018 July 1 st, 2018
employee with a written statement setting out the public holiday the employee will work, when the substitute holiday will be taken, and the date the statement was provided to the employee. A copy of this form must be provided to payroll and retained in the employee HR file. Leaves of Absence Domestic or Sexual Violence Leave: Bill 148 provides for a new leave for employees with at least 13 consecutive weeks of employment where the employee or the employee s child experiences domestic or sexual violence, or a threat thereof. Each calendar year, an employee is entitled to take up to 10 days of leave for more urgent situations and a written notification is not required. Employees are also entitled to up to 15 weeks of leave under this section, but written notification is required. The first five days of this leave taken in each calendar year is paid and the balance of the entitlement is unpaid. The employee must take the leave to seek medical attention, to obtain services from a victim services organization, to obtain counselling, to relocate or to seek legal assistance. January 1, 2018 (except Critical Illness Leave, which came into effect December, 2017) Crime-Related Child Disappearance Leave will increase from 52 up to 104 weeks of leave without pay for employees with 6-months of employment, where a child disappears and it is probable that the disappearance was the result of a crime. Child Death Leave: Bill 148 provides for a new leave without pay for up to 104 weeks to employees with 6-months of employment, for the death of a child (certain exceptions apply). Critically Ill Childcare Leave is replaced by Critical Illness Leave, to provide care or support to a minor child or an adult family member whose life is at risk as a result of an illness or injury. The period of unpaid leave in a 52-week period is up to 37 weeks for a minor child and up to 17 weeks for an adult family member. A child or adult is critically ill when his or her baseline state of health has significantly changed and his or her life is at risk as a result of illness or injury. The employee must have a medical certificate from a qualified health practitioner stating the child or adult is critically ill and requires the care or support or one or more family members. Pregnancy/ Parental Leave Family Medical leave will increase from up to 8 weeks to up to 28 weeks unpaid leave (in a 52- week period). Employees who take a pregnancy leave will receive a maximum of 61 weeks of parental leave (increased from 35). December, 2017
Personal Emergency Leave (PEL) Equal Pay for Equal Work (EPEW) Employees who do not take a pregnancy leave will receive a maximum of 63 weeks of parental leave (increased from 37). Pregnancy leave for still-birth or miscarriage has been increased from 6 to a maximum of 12 weeks. All employees who have completed one week of employment are entitled to 10 personal emergency leave days per year and the first 2 of these days are paid (individuals with multiple contracts will receive this entitlement once for a total of 2 paid days each calendar year), because of any of the following: 1. A personal illness, injury or medical emergency, 2. The death, illness, injury or medical emergency of an individual as prescribed by the legislation, 3. An urgent matter that concerns an individual as prescribed by the legislation. Notes: 1. Unionized employees have entitlements under the Collective Agreement and Bill 148. How emergency leaves are to be treated is currently being discussed centrally with OPSEU. Where alternative leaves exist, the parties must determine whether the current Collective Agreement provisions constitute a greater benefit (number of days, reasons for the leave, etc.). Until we receive direction we will grant two emergency leave days with pay and deduct the entitlement from the sick bank. We will keep track of these requests and once the parties finalize the process we will retroactively make adjustments if necessary. For those employees without a sick bank please record your two PEL days as regular hours and notify your Manager for recordkeeping purposes. Further information will be shared as it becomes available. 2. Doctor s Note: An employer is prohibited from requesting a medical practitioner s certificate from an employee taking personal emergency leave, during those 10 days. Regardless of employment status (i.e. whether full time, part-time, casual, temporary or seasonal), an employee must be paid equally where he or she: performs substantially the same work in the same establishment; requires substantially the same skill, effort and responsibility to perform work; and performs work under similar working conditions. Performing work that is substantially the same is specifically defined in Bill 148 as meaning substantially the same but not necessarily identical. ALL of the above conditions must be met for equal pay for equal work (EPEW) to apply. January 1 st, 2018 April 1 st, 2018 (*) (*) Once the College concludes its assessment, any adjustments will be retroactive to April 1 st, 2018
As some of the changes came into effect on December, 2017, and some provisions will take effect during 2018 or in 2019/20; we will endeavor to provide information and updates as provisions of Bill 148 are implemented by posting these updates on this page. See Bill 148 Notice-Final update document for all communications sent up-to-date. Where can I find additional information about Bill 148? Additional information on Bill 148 is posted on https://www.ontario.ca/page/plan-fair-workplaces-and-betterjobs-bill-148 Should you have any additional questions, please don t hesitate to reach out to Bill148questions@mohawkcollege.ca
FAQs: What employee groups and/or Collective Agreements are affected? The legislation provides for a series of new entitlements which set the minimum employment standards. For non-unionized employees, these changes are effective January 1, 2018. For unionized employees, the collective agreements will continue to apply. If a provision does not meet the new minimum standards, or if there is a conflict between the provision of the collective agreement and the legislation, certain amendments must be negotiated. The parties (OPSEU & College Employer Council) are centrally discussing these issues and once agreed, will communicate the agreement. The collective agreements prevail until either they expire, or amendments are completed; amendments will be updated as soon as possible. How do you calculate Holiday Pay? January 1 to June 30, 2018 - (Bill 148 calculation) An employee s public holiday pay for a given public holiday shall be equal to the total amount of regular wages earned in the pay period immediately preceding the public holiday, divided by the number of days the employee worked in that period. July 1 to December 31, 2018 - (Regulation 375/18 calculation) *expires December 31, 2018 An employee s public holiday pay for a given public holiday shall be equal to the total amount of regular wages earned and vacation pay payable to the employee in the four work weeks before the work week in which the public holiday occurred, divided by 20. If no future statutory changes are made and Regulation 375/18 simply expires, then the Bill 148 method of calculation will come back into force January 1, 2019. If a PT employee has renewed his/her contract multiple times without a break in service, how would you calculate vacation? The College is in the process of analyzing the data of all PT employees who has five years of uninterrupted services (without a break in services between contracts) to determine rights and obligations under the Bill 148 Act and will communicate the results accordingly. Equal pay for equal work (EPEW) Q&As: How will this be applied to part-time and sessional faculty? A determination has been made to continue to pay all part-time and sessional faculty teaching post secondary credit courses as per the partial load grid. The harmonization of these groups was put into effect September 1, 2014. All part-time Post-Secondary Professor rates have been harmonized to match the Collective Agreement. For NON-post secondary PT and Sessional faculty: We are in the process of reviewing the requirements and our obligations as a result of Bill 148, equal pay for equal work, and will communicate the results accordingly. How will this be applied to partial load faculty? Partial load faculty are part of the academic collective agreement and their rates are as outlined in the collective agreement. How will this be applied to part-time support staff? We are in the process of reviewing the requirement and our obligations with regards to part-time support staff positions. We expect to complete our assessment by the fall of 2018. If there is a determination that wage rate adjustments are warranted, we will be communicating directly with the respective employees and their supervisors. If pay is to be adjusted, it will be retroactive to April 1 st, 2018.
How will this be applied to part-time administrative staff? We are in the process of reviewing the requirement and our obligations with regards to part-time administrative staff positions. We expect to complete our assessment by the fall of 2018. If there is a determination that wage rate adjustments are warranted, we will be communicating directly with the respective employees and their supervisors. If pay is to be adjusted, it will be retroactive to April 1 st, 2018. How will bargaining for part-time support staff impact the EPEW requirement? We have an obligation to comply with the employment standards requirements including the equal pay for equal work (EPEW) provision. It s also important to note that at this time, the parties (OPSEU and College Employer Council) are meeting and discussing the terms of the first collective agreement, which will govern employment conditions, and additional pay changes could potentially result. Can employees ask for their position to be reviewed from an Equal pay for equal work (EPEW) perspective? Yes. Once all communications and notifications have been issued following our assessment, employees will be able to request a EPEW review if they believe they are not receiving wages equal to those of fulltime employees. The College will then respond with either a pay adjustment or a written explanation as to why there will be no adjustment. Employees will also be protected against reprisals for requesting this review. The process will be posted on our website in the Bill 148 section once our assessment and determination has been completed. What if an employee disagrees with our EPEW determination? If an employee disagrees with our response, the employee may file a claim with the Ministry of Labour. Will there be any retroactive payments? If there is a determination to change the rate of pay due to our EPEW assessment it will be retroactive to April 1, 2018. Should you have any additional questions, please reach out to Bill148questions@mohawkcollege.ca