Bill 238 explained in plain English
Workplace Safety and Insurance Amendment Act, 2021
Ontario legislature bill summary, status, timeline, sponsor, votes, and official sources.
At a glance
Official Legislative Assembly of Ontario snapshot for 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. Representative vote breakdowns appear when the Assembly publishes an Ayes and Nays page for the bill.
Our plain-language take, written for civic education.
Source: By PoliticalData.ca
Bill 238 amends the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, 1997, to modify premium calculations for employers in 2021 and grant the Minister information-gathering powers from the WSIB.
Bill 238, the Workplace Safety and Insurance Amendment Act, 2021, makes changes to how workplace insurance premiums are calculated for employers in Ontario for the 2021 calendar year. It also gives the Minister of Labour the power to request specific information from the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) to help administer the law. The Act came into effect when it received Royal Assent.
- Amends the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, 1997.
- Introduces a special rule for calculating employer premiums for the 2021 calendar year, limiting the earnings on which premiums are based to $97,308, or another prescribed amount.
- Grants the Lieutenant Governor in Council the power to make regulations about the date the special premium rule ends and to set alternative premium calculation amounts.
- States that any regulation prescribing a later end date for the special premium rule cannot go beyond December 31, 2022.
- Allows the Minister of Labour to direct the WSIB to provide specific information needed for administering the Act.
- Requires the WSIB to provide requested information by a specified date and in a specified format.
- Permits the Minister to delegate the power to request information to the Deputy Minister.
- Specifies that the Act came into force on the day it received Royal Assent.
- Employers in Ontario who pay workplace safety insurance premiums.
- The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB).
- The Minister of Labour, Training and Skills Development.
- The Lieutenant Governor in Council.
- Employers' premiums for 2021 are subject to a maximum earnings threshold.
- The Minister has the right to direct the WSIB to provide information.
- The WSIB has an obligation to provide requested information by a specified date and in a specified format.
- The Act came into force on April 14, 2021, the day it received Royal Assent.
- The special rule for calculating premiums applies to the period beginning January 1, 2021, and ending December 31, 2021, or a later prescribed date.
- Any regulation prescribing a later end date for the 2021 premium exception cannot extend beyond December 31, 2022.
- Modifies the calculation of premiums payable by employers for the 2021 calendar year, potentially affecting the total amount paid by employers based on a maximum earnings amount of $97,308 or a prescribed alternative.
- The exact end date for the special premium calculation rule may be prescribed later by regulation, but it cannot extend beyond December 31, 2022.
- The Lieutenant Governor in Council can prescribe an amount different from $97,308 as the maximum earnings for premium calculation purposes for 2021.
- The information that the Minister may require from the WSIB is not specified in detail but is described as 'necessary for the proper administration of the Act'.
Adds a new section (88.1) to establish an exception for calculating employer premiums for the 2021 calendar year, setting a maximum earnings amount for premium calculation. It also adds a new section (167) that allows the Minister to direct the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board to provide necessary information for the administration of the Act.
Source: Section 1 and Section 2
Grants the Lieutenant Governor in Council the power to create regulations to specify a later end date for the 2021 premium exception (not later than December 31, 2022) and to prescribe an alternative maximum earnings amount for premium calculations.
Source: Section 88.1 (2)
Generated using AI from official bill text. Not legal advice. It is written by PoliticalData.ca for civic education, automatically checked and spot-reviewed before publishing.
Official textProcess Snapshot
Vote Summary
This bill does not have a published recorded division in the current official sources, so representative-by-representative vote counts are not shown.
No published representative vote breakdown
The current official sources do not publish a recorded division breakdown for this bill, so there is no representative-by-representative table to show.
Official sources
Status, sponsor, votes, and timeline on this page are drawn from these official legislative sources and public records. Each summary above is attributed to its own source.
How this data is sourced