Ontario Employment Law Update - 3 Paid Sick Days for Employees

After repeated calls by doctors, health-care workers, and legal advocates for the government to introduce a requirement for employers in the province to provide paid sick leave for employees, the provincial government has finally acted. Specifically, the government today announced a plan to provide employees across the province with three (3) paid sick days. Unfortunately, this measure is only temporary and scheduled to end on September 25, 2021.

Currently, under the Employment Standards Act, 2000, most employees have the right to take up to three days of unpaid job-protected leave each calendar year due to a personal illness, injury or medical emergency (known as “sick leave“), as as long as they have worked for an employer for at least two consecutive weeks.

How the New (Temporary) Paid Sick Leave Days Works

Under the proposed Ontario COVID-19 “Worker Income Protection Benefit” (WIPB) employers would pay employees up to $200 per day if the employee needs time off because:

they are sick with COVID-19
to take a COVID-19 test
they must stay at home awaiting the results of a
they are going to get vaccinated
are experiencing a side effect from a vaccination
an employer, medical practitioner or other authority has advised the employee self-isolate due to
the need to take care of a dependent who is:
- sick with or has symptoms of
- self-isolating due to

Eligibility

The proposed three days of paid sick leave would only be available to employees who:

are employees covered by the Employment Standards Act – that is, they not independent contractors or federally regulated employees would not qualify for these days (see this blog post about who is an employee under the ESA)
do not already receive paid sick time through their employer

The three paid sick days would not need to be taken consecutively, and employees will not need to provide their employer with a doctor’s (sick) note. It will be retroactive to April 19, 2021.

Under the WIPB, employers would be able to apply for a reimbursement of up to $200 per employee day taken from the Ontario government. If the employee’s regular daily salary is less than $200, the employer will only be able reimbursed for their regular daily salary. This WIPB program will be administered through the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board and employers will be reimbursed in full, the province says. Eligible employers would need to apply for reimbursement for their employees’ three paid sick days within 120 days of the paid leave.

Example

Charlie works in a retail store as a Customer Service Associate. He normally makes $15 an hour and works 8-hour shifts, which means his daily salary is $120. Since his employer employer does not already offer paid leave to its employees, if Charlie is feeling unwell and takes a day off work to go for a test, his employer would be required to pay her regular rate of pay ($128) for that day and apply for reimbursement from the Ontario government.

The benefits of allowing employees paid sick leave days cannot be overstated. Even if this measure is only a temporary stopgap response (particularly since employees may be required to self-quarantine for up to 10-14 days), most health professionals agreed – and consistently called upon – the government to implement paid sick leaves. In fact, most health professionals were calling for the government to require employers to provide at least 10 paid sick days, pointing out that it would immediately support not only the employees, but also help minimize the risk and spread of COVID-19 in workplaces by allowing employees to stay home when they are ill or experiencing symptoms of COVID-19.

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