The supervisors the Ford government appointed with direction to bring order and financial restraint to Ontario school boards are billing the province substantially different sums — with one charging almost $240,000 for six months of work.

New invoices obtained by Global News using freedom of information laws show a lack of uniformity in how supervisors appointed by Education Minister Paul Calandra are working and being compensated.

The documents cover roughly a six month period from late April to the end of October, offering an insight into the differing costs of the first period of school board supervision.

The government said the different fees and work schedules for supervisors were because their work is not “one-size-fits-all, and neither is the level of time required at each board.”

Supervisors sent in

Shortly after being appointed education minister last year, Calandra began to take direct control of some school boards.

The province sent a supervisor to the Thames Valley District School Board at the end of April, before appointing supervisors at four boards in Toronto, Ottawa and Peel Region at the end of June.

Under the agreement signed with the province, supervisors can bill up to 3.5 days per week at $2,000 per day. That caps to 50 weeks for a maximum of $350,000 per year.

Back in June, Calandra said he was dispatching the supervisors to bring stability to boards that had lost focus.

“Each of these boards has failed in its responsibilities to parents and students by losing sight of its core mission — ensuring student success,” Calandra said at the time in a statement.

“I will take action to restore focus, rebuild trust and put students first.”

But billing from the supervisors over their first few months in charge of the boards shows the five individuals appointed — including a former Progressive Conservative MPP — have approached the role vastly differently.

The four supervisors appointed at the same time in June, for example, have worked for different lengths of time since. One charged for 63.5 days, another for 55.25. One more bill was for 54 days, and the final supervisor charged for just 46.5.

Three of the five also appear to be completing the work through their companies and charging an extra 13 per cent in sales tax on top of their agreed rate, while two seem not to be adding tax to their invoices.

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While Calandra said supervisors would earn $350,000 per year, those billing HST could cost the government almost $400,000. They’re also eligible for thousands in expenses.

“I thought the supervisor meant $350,000 a year, and I feel like this is very similar to learning that it was $350,000 a year, plus a $40,000 expense account,” Ontario NDP MPP Chandra Pasma said.

“It seems like the minister’s first answer was very careful not to include all the details.”

The different approaches may be most pronounced in Toronto, where two supervisors were appointed to run the Catholic and public boards on the same day. Documents show they have worked vastly different schedules.

Between late June and the end of October, the supervisor at Toronto District School Board billed the taxpayer for 63.5 days at a base rate of $127,000, plus $16,510 in harmonized sales tax.

The Toronto Catholic supervisor, meanwhile, worked 46.5 days, which would equate to $93,000 in total, and didn’t add tax.

One critic suggested the discrepancy showed supervisors were a political play rather than a move to improve school boards.

“There’s no accountability in it; you can say one’s working harder than the other,” Ontario Liberal interim leader John Fraser said.

“This is all political cover, it’s shenanigans. The most identifiable commonality between all these supervisors are their Tory insiders. None of them have really any experience in education. It just further proves that this is a political exercise by the government to cover their tracks.”

Supervisors were appointed to the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board and Ottawa-Carleton at the same time as the Toronto boards and worked roughly 55 days each. The Peel Region supervisor didn’t charge HST, while Ottawa’s did.

A spokesperson for the Minister of Education said the varying days worked was a result of the different boards they had taken over.

“Supervisors are appointed to restore stability, accountability and sound governance at school boards facing serious financial or governance challenges,” they wrote in a statement.

“Some supervisors are working within boards that have stronger administrative capacity already in place, while other boards require significant, hands-on oversight to fix serious governance and financial issues.”

They did not address the issue of why some appeared to have charged HST on top of their rates.

The records also show the supervisor at Dufferin-Peel initially claimed 1,600 km for commuting to and from the job.

The government said that officials informed the supervisor that the claim could be made through expenses, but that it would be a relatively complicated process, and he withdrew the expense.

The supervisor at the Thames Valley District School Board, who was appointed almost two months before the Toronto supervisors, charged $100,000-plus more than any other supervisor.

He billed for 104.5 days between the end of April and the end of October. That would average roughly four days of work each week.

In total, the supervisor charged $209,000 over that period, plus another $27,170 in HST for a total of $236,170.

The Ford government launched more than a dozen forensic audits over the last five years, Global News has confirmed, including several probes at the ministry responsible for the controversial skills development fund.

Forensic audits are detailed investigations into the financial records of service providers that receive funding from the Ontario government.

Run by the Treasury Board, they are typically triggered by red flags or anomalies and are used to verify financial accuracy or detect potential fraud.

In 2025, a forensic investigation into a company contracted by the Ministry of Colleges and Universities uncovered apparent “irregularities,” prompting the Ford government to refer the case to the OPP.

Now, a list obtained by Global News using freedom of information laws shows 19 forensic audits have been launched over the past five years across a range of ministries, suggesting wide-ranging concern with how taxpayer funds are being handled once they leave Queen’s Park.

The government did not respond to questions, including what triggered the audits and whether the findings had led to suspension of funding for companies or referrals to other authorities.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said the government should be learning the lessons from previous mistakes and putting in place guardrails for when companies and ministries face forensic audits.

“I think it’s good that government is doing due diligence; that’s very important,” she said. “My question would be, have these (audits) been flagged and is other money continuing to flow to those companies or to those organizations?”

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The details of the audits are scant. Officials shared a list of ministries, the number of audits, and the years they were conducted and the premier’s office did not respond to any questions.

Topping the list is the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development, which has seen more forensic audits than any other department.

The record shows there were four audits involving the ministry’s vendors in 2024 and one in 2025.

That ministry is responsible for the skills development fund, a controversial training program, which a report from Ontario’s auditor general said was “not fair, transparent or accountable.”

The auditor general also found that the majority of applications selected were ranked low or medium by the Ministry of Labour and that more than 60 of the lower-scoring applicants were approved after hiring a lobbyist.

Last year, it was revealed that Keel Digital Solutions — one of the recipients of skills development funding — was under a forensic audit relating to a contract with another ministry.

Through 2024 and 2025, the company received millions in taxpayer money, even after “irregularities” were flagged. According to a statement of claim the government later filed against Keel, the forensic audit began in 2024.

“We’ve seen in the past, unfortunately, though, that when the government was conducting forensic audits, for example, into a couple of the skills development fund recipients, they did not flag those files,” Stiles added.

“And so other money was continuing to flow to those companies that were under forensic audit.”

Premier Doug Ford previously suggested the province always presumes innocence during audits.

“We cut off the funding as soon as we get the results,” Ford told reporters at Queen’s Park in the fall. “You don’t presume someone guilty right away. What you do is find out if there’s a problem with the money, then we’re the ones who go ahead and call in the OPP.”

Keel said that it has “complied with all laws and contract obligations” and expects to receive a “government apology at the end of this.” It is currently countersuing the provincial government, saying the audit process was “deeply flawed” and secretive.

After months of pressure from opposition parties, the integrity commissioner announced an investigation into the skills development fund last year and Labour Minister David Piccini.

The forensic audit list obtained by Global News shows there were also two investigations at the Ministry of Colleges, Universities, Research Excellence and Security, one in 2022 and another in 2024.

The only audit flagged so far in 2026 involved the Ministry of Health.

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The mayors of Brampton and Mississauga are urging the Ford government to exempt a Toronto-area conservation authority from a planned merger, claiming the changes would pose “significant and immediate risks” to three of the province’s largest cities.

Ontario confirmed this year that it would amalgamate 36 conservation authorities into just nine in an attempt to remove duplication, streamline the permitting processes and fast-track housing developments across the province.

The new structure will also see the creation of an Ontario-wide conservation authority to serve as an oversight body, which will help manage the 75 per cent drop in the number of conservation authorities.

But last week, the mayors of Brampton and Mississauga wrote to Environment Minister Todd McCarthy outlining their “strong opposition” to the plan.

In a joint letter, Patrick Brown and Carolyn Parrish called on the government to consider keeping the Credit Valley Conservation Authority as a stand-alone entity.

The authority, which was created in 1954, is set to be folded into the Western Lake Ontario Regional Conservation, along with the Halton, Hamilton and Niagara Peninsula conservation authorities. It’s move, the mayors argue, would upend the local system.

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“This legislation poses significant and immediate risks to three of Ontario’s largest and most economically critical cities. The stability, safety, and efficiency of our local watershed management system are too important to jeopardize,” the mayors wrote in their letter.

“Any move that threatens to weaken or disrupt the high‑performing services our residents and businesses rely on demands our direct and urgent intervention.”

Brown and Parrish, along with the Region of Peel, argue that the Credit Valley Conservation Authority already exceeds provincial expectations on issuing housing permits — with a response time of 14 days compared to the provincial requirement of 90 days.

Any changes, they wrote, would “slow housing approvals, reduce certainty for builders, and result in fewer shovels in the ground.”

The warnings outlined in the mayor’s letter echo the concerns from the conservation authority’s board of directors, who said municipal planners and developers already have predictable timelines in the region and that any changes could seize up the gears.

“In the context of Ontario’s housing crisis, the last thing we should do is disrupt a system that is already helping get homes built,” said Michael Palleschi, the conservation board chair.

“Transitioning to a new regional bureaucracy would almost certainly slow approvals while staff, systems, and governance structures are reorganized.”

The government is currently targeting early 2027 to complete its amalgamation work, a timeline some have suggested is likely to be pushed back.

“I would suggest that February 2027, as being proposed, is very ambitious,” Tim Lanthier, the CAO of Grey Sauble Conservation Authority, previously told Global News. “It’s our understanding from the media statements that the province has a plan. We’ve yet to see this plan, though.”

Minister McCarthy has pledged that the amalgamation won’t lead to net job losses and insists it is necessary to deal with “fragmentation,” bring efficiency to leadership and standardization to the work conservation authorities do.

“We had a problem with fragmentation and inconsistency,” the minister said. “We identified the solution to that problem. We listened after initially proposing seven, and we’ve arrived at nine.”

The mayors of Brampton and Mississauga called on the government to “reconsider or pause” the proposed legislation “until full consultation with municipalities is completed.”

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Ontario’s transparency watchdog is renewing her calls for the Ford government to scrap its controversial freedom of information crackdown, saying the changes will make the province “less transparent than even the federal government.”

Shortly after a court concluded Premier Doug Ford was using his personal phone to conduct government business and ruled some of those records should be public, the province moved to change access to information laws.

The move — which the government has claimed is simply about improving outdated legislation — will exclude the premier, his cabinet ministers, parliamentary assistants and all their staff from freedom of information requests.

In her submission to the government, Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario Patricia Kosseim urged the government to rethink its approach.

She said the changes will make Ontario less transparent, also raising major security concerns by implicitly allowing the widespread use of personal emails and phones to make public decisions.

“Allowing them to conduct government-related business on their personal email accounts and devices significantly increases the risk of privacy breaches and cyberattacks,” Kosseim wrote.

“These risks are further amplified when they keep these personal email accounts and devices after they leave government.”

Successive rulings by the IPC and then an Ontario court that Ford’s personal phone should be subject to transparency rules hinged on the question of who had “control” over the records, Ford as a private citizen or the government.

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Those decisions essentially focus on whether a record relates to government business and who should be in charge of it, rather than who physically possesses it.

In the case of Ford’s phone, the court ruled against the government and said that because Ford used his personal phone for government work, it should be in the “control” of the province.

The wording of Ontario’s new freedom of information changes is written to include similar language — specifically stating that records under the “control” of a cabinet minister or their staff cannot be released.

Kosseim said that the change would make the province more secretive and less transparent than any of the rest of the country, including the areas with which the government claims it is aligning.

“By excluding these records from (the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act) altogether, even if they relate to government business and are considered to be under the ‘control’ of a ministry, the bill would place Ontario’s legislation offside the rest of the country,” she wrote.

“Precluding the ‘control’ test would make Ontario’s FIPPA less transparent than even the federal law.”

While both the Ontario Liberals and NDP have pledged they would reverse the changes if elected, the commissioner said if the measures pass, they are likely to be permanent.

“The sweeping exclusion of all records of the premier, cabinet ministers, parliamentary assistants and their staff would apply retroactively to 1988,” Kosseim wrote.

“Once the right to access these records is removed, it will be very difficult to restore. This raises serious concerns about the state of Ontarians’ information rights and independent oversight.”

While Premier Ford has said only the media and his political opponents care about restrictions to the existing freedom of information laws, recent polling found a majority oppose the changes.

Research conducted by Abacus Data on behalf of the Canadian Union of Public Employees found just 24 per cent of those asked support the new changes, while 60 per cent are against them. A separate poll by Liaison Strategies found 65 per cent of those polled opposed retroactively changing freedom of information laws.

The government did not respond to questions ahead of publication, but has repeatedly said its changes are about modernizing access to information rules.

Asked why Ontario was going further than other jurisdictions by excluding records, Stephen Crawford, the minister for public and business service delivery and procurement, questioned the role of the information and privacy commissioner.

“In terms of the IPC, the privacy commissioner, I mean, her word is not gospel,” he previously said.

“As you’re probably aware, she lost a case in court in 2024 when she basically challenged the government on cabinet confidentiality, so I wouldn’t place too much emphasis on her words.”

The government has also lost several court cases, including the recent defeat on the release of Ford’s cellphone records.

The changes to freedom of information laws have been included in the government’s budget bill, which is set to head to committee after passing its second reading.

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The Ford government is in the midst of a large-scale advertising campaign, filling both radio and television with commercials that all end with the phrase, “Protect Ontario” — a nod to the Progressive Conservatives’ election slogan.

But how many different commercials the government is currently running and how much they’re costing taxpayers is unclear.

Questions from Global News to the premier’s office asking for a full list of different campaigns, and how much each is budgeted for, have gone unanswered.

Among the campaigns already in circulation is one promoting the government’s vision to develop the mineral-rich Ring of Fire, another touting its plans to build small nuclear reactors and a separate slot broadly discussing building.

There appear to be so many commercials that some think the government could be on course to blast past its commercial budget last year — which was the highest in provincial history.

“It does seem like the path to an even higher ad spend is on track,” Ontario Liberal finance critic Stephanie Bowman told Global News. “It really shows to me they are just pretending to protect Ontario.”

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Auditor General Shelley Spence’s annual review of advertising found that in the fiscal year ending in March 2025, the province spent $111.9 million on advertising — $8.4 million more than the year before, which had already set a record.

The largest campaigns run by the government over that period were its U.S. partnership commercial ads, which ran across major American networks, and a continuation of the “It’s Happening Here” commercial domestically.

Bowman said the spending was hard to justify in a year when the government ran a $13.8 billion deficit — an increase of more than 75 per cent on the year before.

“This is just one more example of the taxpayers of Ontario footing the bill for this government to pat itself on the back,” Bowman added.

Premier Doug Ford has defended his government’s advertising campaign, saying it is important people understand how their money is being spent.

He recently suggested the province would launch a health-care commercial campaign as well.

“Get out there and start telling people what we’re doing for health care because we’re doing so much,” he said in March.

“I think we need to put some information out there, be it social media or commercials or whatever it might be, because people deserve to know what we’re doing. People deserve to know how we’re spending their tax dollars, but I’ll tell you, we’re spending a fortune right now (on health care).”

Previously, the government has said the cost of each campaign will be revealed through the annual public accounts process — but won’t be proactively disclosed.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles accused the government of wasting public money to boost its own reputation.

“Premier Ford and his team aren’t the prudent fiscal managers that they pretend to be,” she said in a statement.

“How do they square that with sinking billions into ridiculous vanity projects, millions into partisan ads to gaslight the people, while running Ontario into a historic deficit, while our hospitals and schools have to beg for help?
 The distance between what the Ford government says and what they do can be measured in kilometres.”

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The union representing transit workers on the TTC is raising alarm bells about the Ford government’s plans to expand fare integration — claiming it could see Toronto residents subsidize fares in neighbouring jurisdictions.

The province announced this week it would expand its fare integration plan policy to harmonize fares across the Toronto region and, in the long-term, look to align schedules in the future.

The policy, the government indicated, was driven in part by the upcoming launch of the Hurontario LRT, which will run between Brampton and Mississauga, charging different fares to transit riders.

The Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) Local 113 raised concerns the legislation tabled to do that will give Ontario “sweeping powers to control transit by regulation,” which governments introduce without debate.

“This is being sold to the public as fare and service integration. But that’s not what this is. This is a power grab,” the union wrote in a statement.

“It gives the Minister of Transportation total control over local service, as well as the power to set fares and spread TTC revenue across the Province, with no certainty for reliable service and ridership growth.”

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The province rejected that suggestion as inaccurate.

Part of the future plans for fare integration would see the government attempt to integrate services across municipal boundaries.

Currently, there are strict boundaries between Toronto-area cities that effectively ban transit agencies from operating in each other’s jurisdictions.

A bus heading to the Toronto subway from Mississauga, for example, cannot pick up new passengers when it enters the city, even if they’re waiting at a stop. Only a TTC bus can accept them.

The Toronto Transit Commission’s chief strategy and customer officer, Josh Colle, said at a recent Toronto Region Board of Trade that union concerns were one of the key barriers to changing that.

“The collective agreements are our barrier and one we are working through,” he explained.

“I think the positive take on that is this is only going to work if we bring everyone along, including the people who actually operate the buses, and so that’s something we’re working on.”

ATU said it was concerned about what the government might do with some of the powers in the legislation.

“It also specifically allows the government to impose fares by distance or mandate different fares for bus, LRT or subway,” the union wrote. “For the first time in over a century riders may have to pay to transfer within TTC.”

The government rejected the idea it would charge extra to transfer within Toronto.

“These are inaccurate and misguided claims,” a spokesperson told Global News.

“Our legislation introduced earlier this week further integrates transit fares, saving money for families who are travelling into Toronto from the GTHA. It does not impact service nor force unnecessary transfers as the ATU inaccurately claims.”

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Ontario’s attorney general will neither condemn nor support Premier Doug Ford’s suggestion that a provincial judge should apologize for her instructions to the jury in the trial of Umar Zameer.

The high-profile case saw Zameer acquitted of first-degree murder in the death of Det. Const. Jeffrey Northrup, a plainclothes officer who was fatally run over in downtown Toronto in the summer of 2021.

During the case, the judge called into question the testimony of three central witnesses — all Toronto police detectives — in the Crown’s argument, suggesting they lied and colluded.

Then, last month, an Ontario Provincial Police investigation into the allegation cleared the Toronto officers. It was a conclusion Zameer’s lawyer vehemently contested.

After the investigation was published, both the Toronto police union president and Premier Ford said the judge should apologize for suggesting the officers had lied.

Ford, specifically, said the veteran judge “should apologize for accusing (the officers) of everything under the sun.”

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The comments came before MPPs returned to the legislature. Now, roughly two weeks later, Attorney General Doug Downey, who serves in Ford’s cabinet and oversees the judicial system, refused to be drawn on the issue.

Asked if the premier should have weighed into the issue, Downey said he was “not commenting on that.”

The province’s top lawyer also declined to say if the judge should apologize or if he had received complaints from legal groups.

“It sounds like a line of questioning that I’m not commenting on,” Downey responded when asked if the premier’s comments had made his job harder.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said the premier was putting his attorney general in a difficult position by weighing in on judicial decisions and process.

“It means the attorney general is stuck, once again, picking up the pieces for a premier who’s out of control,” she said. “And that’s what this government is always doing, right? Protect the king at all costs.”

The calls for the judge to apologize elicited a rare rebuke from Ontario’s chief justice, who said an independent judiciary is a “cornerstone of our constitutional democracy” in a statement.

“It would be inappropriate and unethical for judges to succumb to outside pressure to modify or qualify their decisions or reasons,” the chief justice wrote in a March 19 statement.

The Federation of Ontario Law Associations was among the legal organizations to issue a similar statement, pointing directly to Ford and the police union president’s calls for an apology.

“These statements are appalling and an inappropriate attack on judicial independence. These statements are an unconcealed attempt to subvert the justice system,” the group said.

Ontario Liberal interim leader John Fraser said the premier’s demand was wrong, and that the attorney general didn’t defend it because he may also be uncomfortable with the intervention.

“He’s the top lawmaker in Ontario; he knows it’s wrong. He knows it’s wrong,” he said. “His boss shouldn’t have said that… It was wrong. The attorney general knows that.”

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The Ford government says it will not give nurse practitioners billing codes, but will work to bring them into the publicly funded health-care system as the federal deadline to ensure coverage for medically necessary services passes.

More than a year ago, the federal health minister wrote to Ontario, telling the province to come up with a policy to fund and regulate nurse practitioners by April 1.

Despite getting the clarity it had requested, the Ford government missed the deadline.

Health Minister Sylvia Jones said she felt the federal approach lacked uniformity and could download costs.

“There is no additional Canada Health Transfer. We are going to see inconsistency across provinces and territories, but Ontario will be in compliance,” she told reporters on Monday.

“I want to see nurse practitioners practise in our publicly funded system. I want them embedded in our multidisciplinary teams. I want them working in our hospitals.”

Jones said the province hadn’t “done a fiscal” analysis of how much bringing nurse practitioners into the public system would cost.

Nurse practitioners have said they are looking for flexible funding models, such as those for family doctors, who can bill OHIP on a fee-for-service basis or who are paid per patient enrolled.

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Jones said she has “no plans” to let nurse practitioners bill OHIP directly for services through the use of billing codes, saying that would have to be negotiated with the Ontario Medical Association.

The health minister did not say what approach she would take instead to bring nurse practitioners into the public system.

Liberal health critic Adil Shamji said it was a mistake to rule out billing codes before consulting with health-care experts.

“I think that there are many different ways that nurse practitioners could be publicly funded,” he told reporters.

“I’ve spoken to nurse practitioners; some are interested in that model, others are interested in other models altogether, whether they’re paid hourly wages or they’re brought on in a salaried model.”

Critics said it was “shocking” the government had missed the deadline — although Ontario won’t face penalties for non-compliance until next year.

“What has she [Jones] been doing? She’s been in this role for years now,” Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said.

“This government has been in power for eight years. They’ve now missed the deadline for the nurse practitioners’ agreement. And again, did she not have time to figure this out?”

Nurse practitioners in Ontario can assess patients, order and interpret tests, and prescribe medication and treatment. They work in a variety of settings, including family health teams and community health teams, hospitals and long-term care homes, as well as in more than two dozen publicly funded nurse practitioner-led clinics.

Two years ago, a proliferation of private subscription fee-based nurse practitioner clinics made headlines. Jones responded to opposition and media questions by putting the onus on the federal government to close a “loophole” that allowed them to operate.

“If there is a wedge that is allowing these clinics to happen, then perhaps the member opposite could pick up the phone and call their federal counterparts, because that’s what I’ve been doing,” she said in question period in March 2024.

The next month, Jones formally wrote to the federal government asking them to make the change.

While Ontario began funding 25 nurse practitioner-led clinics in 2011, the Ford government expanded the program by including an additional seven clinics under the funding envelope in the early 2020s.

In her letter in 2024, Jones asked the federal government to “work with provinces and territories on a Canada-wide solution to close this loophole, to guard against unintended consequences, and prohibit nonphysicians from charging for publicly funded services.”

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The number of senior leaders at provincial transit agency Metrolinx has increased again as a review of its reliance on external consultants brings some axed contractors on board as full-time, high-paid staff.

Data released through Ontario’s annual salary disclosures, known as the sunshine list, reveals there were 124 people at Metrolinx with vice-president in their title last year — a five-per cent increase on 2024.

The average salary for a vice-president at the Crown corporation was roughly $248,000 in 2025, according to the list. That’s up from $243,000 in 2024 and $237,000 the year before.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said spending at the agency, which now has as many vice-presidents as there are MPPs in the province, was spiralling.

“Despite the government’s claims they were going to get Metrolinx under control, there are now 124 vice-presidents at Metrolinx,” she said.

“Under this government, the people at the top, the CEOs, the vice-presidents, they continue to grow. The premier keeps giving himself and his friends raises, and yet what do we have for it? Life has become and continues to be completely unaffordable for Ontarians.”

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The number also represents a short-term setback for Metrolinx CEO Michael Lindsay in his efforts to overhaul and reform the agency he inherited from former boss Phil Verster a little over a year ago.

Since taking over at the top, Lindsay has signalled he wants to move the Crown corporation away from some of its legal battles of the past, cut the number of third-party consultants it pays and rein in the size of its leadership.

During his first year, Metrolinx shed more than 400 full-time and part-time consultants, including people on contracts with its planning and procurement divisions. That success, which the agency said saved it $100 million, looks like it is partially responsible for the increase in vice presidents.

7:05
Metrolinx CEO on lessons learned and moving the region forward

During a sit-down interview with Global News this year, Lindsay said some of the consultants he had been able to get off the agency’s books had then been hired as senior leaders.

“There’s been reductions in the total complement of both Metrolinx as an organization, but also, even more significantly, a sharp reduction in the number of third-party consultants that are around,” he said.

“With many of those third-party consultants, I’m delighted to say, converting to be Metrolinx full-time employees, bringing their subject matter expertise in a durable way to this region.”

The six vice-president positions Metrolinx added between 2024 and 2025 is a slower rate of growth than the 36 that joined its ranks the year before. The figure could include someone departing and their replacement if both made more than $100,000 in 2024 or compensation packages for former employees.

In a brief statement, the agency said its increase in VPs came after savings had been made relating to consultants.

“As Metrolinx delivers the largest transit expansion in Ontario’s history, we are strengthening in house expertise and reducing reliance on hundreds of third-party contractors, resulting in $100 million of savings,” they wrote in a statement.

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