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Time for Action
Special Report to Parliament on Pay Equity 
 February 2001 

© Minister of Public Works and Government Services 2001
Cat. No. HR21-54/2001
ISBN 0-662-65445-5

Table of Contents

Introduction

Why Pay Equity?

The Current Model at the Federal Level

Goals and Guiding Principles for Improved Pay Equity Provisions

Appendix I: Excerpts from International Instruments on Human Rights

Appendix II: Job Evaluation

Appendix III: Canadian Human Rights Act

Appendix IV: Equal Wages Guidelines

Appendix V: Chronologies of Two Major Cases

The purpose of this report is to review the rationale for pay equity legislation, assess how federal pay equity provisions have worked up to now, and suggest how those provisions might be improved. The report reflects the Canadian Human Rights Commission’s 23 years of experience with pay equity. We hope it will serve to dispel common misunderstandings regarding pay equity and inform the public about challenges associated with the present system for achieving pay equity at the federal level.

When the Commission proposed modernization of federal pay equity provisions in 1987, some observers felt – correctly, as it turned out – that government action on the issue was unlikely. That no longer appears to be true. The Ministers of Justice and Labour have recently appointed an independent expert to head a Task Force that will review federal pay equity legislation. The Commission welcomes this initiative and believes that such a review takes on added urgency in light of a recent Federal Court of Canada decision calling into question the institutional independence of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal.¹

1. Bell Canada v. Canada (Human Rights Commission). Federal Court of Canada (Trial Division); Court file no. T-890-99: November 2, 2000. An appeal against the decision has been filed by the Canadian Human Rights Commission.