Ministers' Offices Grouped for Pay Equity

Summary#

This is a proposed order, the Order Grouping Ministers’ Offices for the Purpose of a Pay Equity Plan, published in the Canada Gazette on February 10, 2024. It would group all federal ministers’ offices together so they use one shared pay equity plan and would make every ministers’ office subject to the Pay Equity Act, even small offices that currently fall below the Act’s usual 10‑employee threshold.

What it does#

• Groups all federal ministers’ offices so they must establish and update a single, collective pay equity plan for their combined ministerial staff.
• Changes the rules so every ministers’ office is covered by the Pay Equity Act regardless of how many staff it has (so offices with 1–9 staff would now be included).
• Shortens the regular pay‑equity update cycle for grouped ministers’ offices from 5 years to 3 years.
• Requires that any pay increases identified by the pay equity plan be paid in full immediately (no phased‑in, multi‑year payments).
• Makes the administrative penalty system apply consistently to small ministers’ offices by matching penalty ranges to those for offices with 10 to 99 staff.
• Sets the date when the grouped ministers’ offices become subject to the Act as either the day the order is registered or the day a new ministry (a new Prime Minister) is appointed.
• The government says the order and related regulations are planned to come into force in spring 2024. Interested people can comment within 30 days of the Gazette notice.

Who's affected#

• Ministers’ offices across the federal government — the proposal treats them as one grouped employer for pay equity purposes.
• Ministerial staff (the people employed by ministers) — especially staff in predominantly female job classes who could receive pay adjustments.
• The Canadian Human Rights Commission and the office of the Pay Equity Commissioner, which would administer and audit the single plan and handle filings and enforcement.
• A small number of ministers’ offices that currently have fewer than 10 staff — the government estimates 2 to 5 such offices (while 34 to 37 offices already have 10 or more staff).
• The proposal estimates pay adjustments from bringing small offices into scope would cost less than $1 million per year in total.
• The notice also gives time estimates: about 3 hours to gather pay‑equity data and 5 hours to prepare an annual statement for the smallest offices (these are government estimates).

Why it matters#

• The change aims for more consistent pay equity across all ministers’ offices. That means two people doing similar ministerial jobs for different ministers would be more likely to get similar pay adjustments.
• Bringing small ministers’ offices under the Act closes a gap so more ministerial staff could benefit from proactive pay‑equity reviews rather than relying on individual complaints.
• Shorter update cycles and the ban on phased payments are intended so pay gaps are found and fixed within a typical government term, reducing the chance a ministry leaves before owing full adjustments.
• For the public, this affects how taxpayer‑funded offices handle staff pay and how the federal government enforces pay equity among the Prime Minister’s ministers and their teams.
• This is a proposal, not yet law. The government invited comments for 30 days after publication before deciding whether to finalize the order and regulations.