Hydro One CEO's $4.84M salary won’t affect promised 25% cut to hydro bills

“Regardless of salary, we will be making a 25 per cent cut for the residents,” cabinet minister Liz Sandals said Thursday following outrage over $11 million in compensation shared by Hydro One execs.

Thestar.com
March 30, 2017
By Rob Ferguson

The “very large” $4.84 million pay packet of Hydro One boss Mayo Schmidt won’t stand in the way of a promised 25 per cent rate cut on electricity bills, says cabinet minister Liz Sandals.

As opposition parties howled in outrage over $11 million in salary and incentives shared by Schmidt and his four top executives, Sandals said Thursday that the cost has no impact on skyrocketing hydro bills.

That’s because the money is a fraction of the cost of operating Ontario’s multibillion dollar electricity system.

“The CEO’s salary is not part of the equation,” said Sandals, who controls the government’s purse strings as president of the treasury board for Premier Kathleen Wynne.

“We recognize that it is a very high salary ... regardless of salary, we will be making a 25 per cent cut for the residents,” she added shortly before walking away from reporters.

Controversy over the Hydro One pay - released earlier this week as required under securities laws - foreshadowed Friday’s release of the annual “Sunshine List” of provincial public sector workers earning $100,000 or more.

That list, which grows every year as more workers cross the threshold, has become a lightning rod for concerns about levels of public sector pay.

The Liberal government has repeatedly refused calls from the Progressive Conservatives and New Democrats to force Hydro One to resume reporting the salaries of thousands of its employees earning $100,000 or more.

This will be the second year Hydro One is no longer on the Sunshine List because it became exempt when shares were first sold to the public.

The executive salaries are “proof just how out of touch the Wynne Liberals have become,” said Progressive Conservative MPP Todd Smith, his party’s energy critic.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said it is ironic the Liberals say on one hand that the government maintains majority control of Hydro One and yet Sandals acknowledges the CEO’s compensation is huge.

“What it truly shows is that the Liberals have been talking out of both sides of their mouth when it comes to control over Hydro One,” Horwath charged.

“It just shows the duplicity of this government.”

Hydro One issued a statement earlier this week saying the new executive team has cut $25 million in costs - more than double their annual compensation - and improved customer service.

Smith said a Conservative government would introduce legislation ordering Hydro One back on the Sunshine List if elected next spring, but acknowledged that would be impossible if the Wynne administration sells more shares to lower its stake to 50 per cent or less.

So far, the government has sold 30 per cent of the shares in Hydro One and is planning to sell another 30 per cent, leaving taxpayers with a 40 per cent stake.

The government says it will maintain majority control because no other shareholder is allowed to take more than a 10 per cent stake in the transmission utility.

Wynne is selling the shares to raise an estimated $9 billion to improve public transit and other infrastructure, as well as pay down debt in the electricity system.