Ontario school board audits target wage-freeze violations

Education Minister Liz Sandals’s office is auditing school boards across Ontario to determine how many senior staffers received pay hikes that contravene a public-sector wage freeze. And for the first time since the freeze came into force three years ago, Ms. Sandals is stipulating which board employees are affected by the legislation and ordering those given raises to repay the money.

The minister is clamping down after a controversy over the salary of the top-ranking staffer at the Toronto District School Board. Ms. Sandals is giving education directors at the province’s 72 public, separate and French-language school boards until Friday to provide her ministry with the materials needed for the audits. These include declarations on whether their own salaries and those of superintendents and other executives comply with the legislation. Any boards that raised salaries must present the ministry with a repayment plan by April 2 that can include unpaid days off for the employees or a reduction in future compensation.  (more...)

Ontario school board audits target wage-freeze violations