Municipal employees paid more than provincial counterparts: report
Posted September 15, 2014 7:49 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – A report commissioned by the province shows some municipal employees are getting hefty wage increases.
The BC Core Review Report shows between 2001 and 2012, municipal employees received 38 per cent pay hikes.
Jordan Bateman with the Canadian Taxpayers’ Federation says inflation during that time was 23 per cent.
“Since 2001, provincial government wages had gone up 19 per cent. You have a situation now where many jobs in municipalities have been paid far more than their counterparts in the provincial government,” he says.
Bateman adds it comes down to what’s happened post-Olympics.
“In the lead up to the Olympics the provincial government and, frankly, most municipal governments handed out lucrative deals to all the various unions to get labour peace during the Olympic Games. After that, the provincial government went to net zero, trying to contain their labour costs that way. Municipalities just kept spending and giving raises to employees,” he explains.
The report shows municipalities have a higher percentage of employees making $75,000 a year or more than in the province.
