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The move seems to reverse policy from last December, when city staff proposed an operating budget for 2012 that cut 324 TTC jobs. The TTC absorbed those cuts by running fewer, more crowded buses and streetcars, adding that it was looking at contracting out another 500 jobs in maintenance-type positions and cleaning.

“It’s a significant reduction,” TTC chair Karen Stintz said at the time. “We were advised we needed to reduce our head count and change our organization and adjust to the new fiscal realities of the city.”

But Brad Ross, a TTC spokesman, made no mention of restraint on Thursday. He said the TTC also may add more overtime hours with its current staff.

“It’s more efficient and less costly for the TTC to pay overtime than hire people to fill that work,” Mr. Ross said. He said paying current operators and maintenance workers overtime means they don’t have to pay extra in pension and dental benefits for new staff.

“In some cases it’s time and a half and in some cases it’s straight time,” he said. Straight time means paying people to be available.

A six-month interim report released on June 30 shows the TTC spent $34-million on overtime in that period. The total overtime spending at the TTC for 2011 was $72-million. Toronto’s auditor-general Jeff Griffiths predicts overtime costs this year will about equal last year’s totals.

The TTC’s audit committee met Thursday at City Hall but was unable to judge whether there was an operational need/justification for the overtime earned, or whether the unusually high level of overtime spending is to continue.

Mr. Ross said the TTC needs people on standby to fill in gaps in regular service. As well, maintenance workers sometimes have to work extra hours due to events such as the recent flooding in Union Station or other emergency repairs.

These staff are “waiting for someone to call in sick, or if a bus breaks down and we need to get another bus on the street.”

“We do budget for overtime,” he said. “Overtime is necessary for various reasons.”