Government changing tune on 20-per-cent pay hike for Canadian Forces personnel
The Liberal government appears to be backsliding on its promise to provide an immediate 20-per-cent raise to Canadian military personnel, instead now unsure of when that pay hike will come and how much it will actually be.
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Defence Minister David McGuinty told journalists June 10 that improvements were coming in military benefits, housing and health care. 'That's where a lot of the initial investment will be, of course, including a 20-per-cent pay increase,' he said.
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Several hours later, the defence minister stated in another interview that the pay hike would be immediate. 'It's about a 20-per-cent pay increase immediately for our members,' McGuinty said in an interview with Newstalk 1010 radio.
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But now McGuinty's office and the Department of National Defence can't provide a date for when the troops will see the raise on their paycheques or say whether it will actually be 20 per cent.
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'We look forward to sharing more details in the near future,' noted an email from McGuinty's office sent to the Ottawa Citizen by press secretary Laurent de Casanove.
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The same statement about the pay increase also suggested that the hike might not come to a 20-per-cent across-the-board pay raise, but that figure represented instead an overall funding increase that also included retention bonuses and other initiatives directed only to specific military personnel.
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'This investment represents an almost 20-per-cent increase to the overall CAF compensation envelope and the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces are actively working on how best to implement this investment — looking at options that include a combination of approaches such as retention bonuses for stress trades, increased starting salaries for junior members and a broad-based salary increase,' the email noted.
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McGuinty's office did not respond to a request for clarification on whether the announced 20-per-cent pay increase was instead a boost to the overall compensation budget that also included retention bonuses and other benefits.
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Prime Minister Mark Carney announced a $9-billion spending increase June 9 that will hike Canada's defence and security budget to an all-time high of $62.7 billion annually by next year. The prime minister noted the salary increases, which he pointed out were well-deserved and would contribute to retaining personnel in the ranks as well as to attracting new recruits.
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