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TORONTO – NDP Finance Critic Michael Prue is reintroducing legislation which would ban restaurant owners and managers from taking a share of their employees’ tips.

“The most egregious practice here is the taking of tip money by employers,” Prue said. “When the management skims off four or five per cent it goes directly to profit and no income tax is taken off that.”

Prue first introduced the private members’ bill in June 2012, but it died when the Ontario Legislature was prorogued upon the resignation of Dalton McGuinty.

Wait staff in Ontario have a minimum wage of $8.90 an hour – over a dollar less than the $10.25 for most workers in the province.

Prue contends that some managers and owners take a significant portion – if not all – of the wait staffs’ tips, and wants to end that practice, saying the workers rely on those tips to supplement their lower minimum wage.

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“This is very, very widespread,” Prue said. “We have heard from some restaurants that tip outs are 100 per cent.”

Amanda Barchard – who appeared at a press conference along with Prue – said she was fired from a Cobourg restaurant after she complained about the owners taking four per cent of her tips.

Labour Minister Yasir Naqvi agreed that Ontario needs a regulation that would keep owners and management from taking a cut of their employees’ tips.