Summary#

Bill 88, the Working for Workers Act, 2022, was enacted. It creates the Digital Platform Workers’ Rights Act, 2022 and amends the Employment Standards Act, 2000, the Fair Access to Regulated Professions and Compulsory Trades Act, 2006, and the Occupational Health and Safety Act. Its stated goal is to establish rights for digital platform workers and make several other changes related to work.

• Digital platform operators must provide pay and work-assignment information, pay at least the applicable minimum wage for each assignment, pay amounts and tips owed, and give notice before removing access in many cases.
• Employers with 25 or more employees must have a written electronic-monitoring policy and give it to employees. The policy must describe whether, how and why the employer may monitor; it does not limit the employer’s use of information gathered.
• Eligible business and information technology consultants are excluded from the Employment Standards Act if they meet conditions, including a written payment agreement at a rate of at least $60 an hour, or another prescribed amount.
• Reservist leave eligibility is expanded to include Canadian Armed Forces military skills training, and the required period of employment is reduced from six to three consecutive months.
• Ontario regulated professions must meet response and decision deadlines for applicants registered in the same profession in another Canadian province or territory, unless the Minister grants an exemption.
• Employers must provide and maintain a naloxone kit, with a trained worker in charge of it, when they know or ought reasonably to know of a possible overdose risk at a workplace. Maximum fines under the health and safety law also increase.

What it means for you#

• Digital platform workers: The new Act applies to workers performing covered ride-share, delivery, courier or other prescribed work in Ontario, whether or not they are employees. Operators must give information about pay, tips, assignment offers and performance ratings; pay at least the applicable minimum wage for each assignment, excluding tips from the calculation; and pay earned amounts and tips on a recurring schedule. They generally must give a written reason for removing access, and two weeks’ notice if removal lasts 24 hours or more. The Act also protects against reprisal and requires work-related disputes to be resolved in Ontario.
• Digital platform operators: They must keep specified worker and payment records for three years after access ends. Compliance officers can inspect and investigate, and may order payments or other steps to correct a breach. Operators grouped as one business under the Act can be jointly and severally liable (each can be held responsible for the full amount).
• Employees and employers: Employers covered by the electronic-monitoring rule must give employees, including certain temporary-help-agency assignment employees, a copy of the policy within set deadlines. The rule requires disclosure, not employee consent or a limit on monitoring.
• Consultants: The Employment Standards Act exclusion applies only if the consultant works through a qualifying corporation or registered sole proprietorship, has the required written agreement and is paid the agreed rate.
• Applicants to regulated professions: Domestic labour mobility applicants are entitled to written acknowledgment within 10 business days and a registration decision within 30 business days after the profession has the complete application. Reasons and information about review or appeal rights are also required.
• Workers and employers at workplaces: The naloxone duty depends on a possible risk of overdose or prescribed circumstances. The Act requires a trained worker to be in charge of the kit while workers are present.

Money#

No cost estimate is available in the supplied material.

• Operators may have costs for minimum-wage payments, tips, records and compliance. Orders to pay through the Director can also include administrative costs of at least $100 or 10% of the amount owed, whichever is greater.
• Employers may have costs for electronic-monitoring policies and, where the naloxone duty applies, kits and training.
• The Act increases maximum health and safety fines: up to $500,000 for other individuals and up to $1.5 million for corporations. A director or officer who fails to comply with a specified duty can face up to $1.5 million and up to 12 months’ imprisonment.
• No tax or fee change for the public is specified.

What is unclear#

• The supplied material does not show whether the provisions set to start by proclamation have since been brought into force, or their start dates.
• Regulations may add to or change details, including which platform work is covered, exceptions, penalties, naloxone kit contents and training requirements.
• The digital platform Act does not set out every detail of how complaints and investigations will work in practice. Some terms and coverage can also be clarified by regulation.
• The materials do not estimate staffing or other public costs for administering and enforcing the new rights.
• The parent Acts were not supplied, so the full current-law baseline and possible overlap with existing rules could not be checked.

Case for#

• The platform rules create specific minimum protections for workers who may not be employees, including minimum pay per assignment, tips, information and protection from reprisal.
• Requiring written monitoring policies may make employers’ practices and purposes clearer to employees.
• Set deadlines for domestic labour mobility applications may make the registration process more predictable.
• A kit and trained worker may improve readiness where an overdose risk exists at work.

Case against#

• Many important details are left to regulations, and the platform Act gives the government power to make different rules for different groups of workers and operators.
• A written electronic-monitoring policy does not restrict monitoring or how employers use collected information.
• Employers may face costs for policies, naloxone kits and training; no estimate is provided.
• The naloxone duty depends on a risk threshold or prescribed circumstances, whose full scope is not clear from the supplied text.