Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office is vowing to fix a bureaucratic glitch that has resulted in a number of the women in his new cabinet being ministers of state rather than full ministers — leaving them with a salary $20,000 a year lower than their counterparts.

However, the PMO says it cannot yet state exactly when and how it will fix it the problem, adding it isn’t something that can be changed “overnight.” The office is pledging that the women affected will be treated as full ministers and receive retroactive pay.

The pledge came after iPolitics revealed that while Trudeau publicly pledged to have gender equity in his cabinet, orders in council adopted behind closed doors during his first cabinet meeting spell out that five ministers are designated as ministers of state: Kirsty Duncan (Science), Marie-Claude Bibeau (Francophonie), Patricia Hajdu (Status of Women), Carla Qualtrough (Sport and Persons with Disabilities) and Bardish Chagger (Small Business and Tourism).

In the case of Bibeau, however, she was also sworn in as the minister of international development, making her a full minister as well as a minister of state, the official confirmed Friday.

That means that one quarter of the women in Trudeau’s cabinet are ministers of state rather than full ministers. None of the ministers of state in Trudeau’s cabinet are men.

While a cabinet minister earns $80,100 above and beyond the basic MP salary of $167,400, according to the parliamentary pay scale a minister of state earns only $60,000 on top of the MP salary. While they receive many of the other perks of a full cabinet post — such as a car and driver — they are not normally among those legally authorized to sign orders in council and usually have to answer to a more senior minister.

However, the official said Trudeau’s office has decided that the women who are ministers of state will have the right to attend all cabinet meetings and will have signing authority.

The official could not yet explain how the problem happened in the first place.

NDP MP Irene Mathyssen said she doesn’t understand why the women were designated as ministers of state versus ministers in the first place.

“I don’t understand what the technical reason for not making them full ministers is. I don’t know what the technical reason is for making five women ministers of state who have to report to other ministers and not having any male ministers of state that have to report to a minister.”

Mathyssen said she was optimistic to see the decision to appoint an equal number of women and men to cabinet but feels it was then diluted.

“To see it undermined by making women have to report to a full minister, that’s not taking into account how incredibly qualified, how very capable these women are. It’s just extremely disappointing. There’s a big difference between what they claimed they were doing and what it is in reality and I am just so very sad about it.”

Conservative Michelle Rempel, who was sharply critical on Twitter of the move to make some women in cabinet ministers of state, and Conservative Leader Rona Ambrose have not yet responded to a request from iPolitics for an interview.

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