Eligible lower-income workers helping Saskatchewan’s most vulnerable citizens through the COVID-19 pandemic can now apply to the Saskatchewan Temporary Wage Supplement Program.
For each eligible worker, the temporary wage supplement is $400 for each four-week period, up to 16 weeks, for the period from March 15, 2020 to July 4, 2020. To be eligible, a worker must earn a wage less than $24.00 per hour at an eligible essential care facility, in the four-week period for which the worker has applied for the supplement.
An eligible worker must also have total earnings less than $2,500, including earnings from work outside an eligible essential care facility, in the four-week period for which the worker has applied for the supplement.
Eligible essential care facilities include:
- Public and private senior care homes;
- Community-based group and personal care homes;
- Licensed childcare facilities;
- Emergency shelters;
- Transition shelters (short stay/emergency, transition housing);
- Integrated healthcare facilities; and
- Home-care workers providing care to seniors in their own homes.
The wage supplement will be provided to full-time, part-time and casual essential workers, and includes anyone employed by an eligible facility, such as care workers, cooks, housekeepers, janitors and administrative staff, but does not include third-party contract service providers working at those facilities.
The supplement is available to an estimated 35,000 lower-income workers at essential care facilities across Saskatchewan.
