The head of Hydro One makes double the salary of his next highest-paid provincial counterpart, and 10 times that of some CEOs in smaller provinces.

At $4.4 million in salary and bonuses in 2016, Hydro One CEO Mayo Schmidt is well above the Alberta CEO, whose pay package topped out at $2.2 million in 2015.

On Wednesday, Ontario PC Leader Patrick Brown said if elected, he would clamp down on salaries at Hydro One and electricity producer Ontario Power Generation, through legislative or policy changes, though he was not specific.

“It’s time to stop rewarding the people who are presiding over the Wynne Liberal hydro rip-off,” Brown said in a written statement. “These are the same people who have presided over a system that has tripled our hydro bills since 2003.”

In a statement to the Star, Energy Minister Glenn Thibeault said the “government recognizes that every dollar of public money should be spent with good intention and thorough consideration — both need to be taken into account whenever proposing salaries.

“We recognize that executive salaries are high compared to the vast majority of Ontario salaries, and we’ve introduced new regulations that require rigorous review of executive compensation frameworks. Our guidelines also create more stringent executive benefits, and we’ll continue to focus on ensuring that salaries are fair to the public purse.”

For five years, the NDP has been calling on the government to rein in public sector CEO compensation, said MPP Catherine Fife, who criticized the PCs for initiating the move toward hydro privatization when in power under Mike Harris.

“We’ve been calling for greater oversight, independent oversight, of those salaries, but we’ve been on the record for at least five years now to address the public sector compensation issue, because the public considers (the high salaries) a slap in the face, as they should,” Fife said in a telephone interview.

Rafael Gomez, director of the Centre for Industrial Relations and Human Resources at the University of Toronto, agreed, saying the former Tory government’s moves, as well as the recent selling of shares under by Liberal government, encourages utilities to start acting more like private sector corporations.

And when they look to set CEO pay levels, they turn to private sector comparisons “because there’s no company large enough that you can find in a public setting … so they go to the private sector and the comparables become GM and that sort of thing.”

In a statement to the Star, Hydro One said its “executive compensation package reflects the company’s need to attract and retain the highest level of expertise in a marketplace where it is competing for talent with large private-sector companies across North America, including other investor-owned utilities.”

Natalie Poole-Moffatt, vice-president of corporate affairs, also said 80 per cent of the CEO’s salary is based on meeting performance targets.

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