By Taylor Chartrand

Locals weigh in on UCP Leader Jason Kenney’s comments on minimum wage

Feb 17, 2019 | 8:13 PM

Medicine Hat, AB – United Conservative Party (UCP) Leader Jason Kenney voiced his opinion last week on minimum wage and the impact it is having on youth employees and alcohol servers within the province.

Kenney said if his party wins power in the upcoming election, it would seriously consider reducing the minimum wage for youth employees and alcohol servers.

Locally, Dan Hamilton is the owner of the Dunmore Dugout and employs a large number of youth.

“I think youth should be paid less, but it should be up to the employer,” explained Hamilton. “We get a lot of 15, 16 and 17-year-old kids, this is their first job, zero qualifications. Some of these kids don’t even know how to turn on a vacuum cleaner. So, it’s very hard to justify that kind of a wage for them.”

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Hamilton supports a minimum wage rollback, as the increase has severely impacted his business.

“We went from about 45 employees at this establishment down to 10 on the books now and we’ve had to cut a lot of shifts.”

Hamilton says he hasn’t increased prices at the Dugout yet, but it is something he may have to consider.

“I’ve been talking about this for a couple years and I’ve seen it coming. It’s built up to this and it’s unfortunate that we’re in this position. Hopefully, something can be done, especially for the youth side.”

In addition to Hamilton, Chris Czember is the owner of BB’s dollhouse and said if minimum wage didn’t get to $15 an hour, industry professionals like himself wouldn’t have had to raise prices and cut their staffs hours.

“Kenney’s comments on looking into reducing minimum wage from $15 to an unknown amount, comes with some mixed reviews in the industry,” said Czember. “I think he’s got an idea there. A lot of the staff want to have hours back and be at work so they can make their tips and whatnot.”

Just like Hamilton, Czember has had to make some changes to the way he does business.

“From a $9.60 minimum wage three years ago to $15 now, equates to a 60% increase and that comes right off our bottom line. We unfortunately had to raise prices over the last three years because of it. In addition, we’ve eliminated a couple position, which means that I work more and other owners work more, just to help off set that.”

The NDP Government first introduced wage increases in 2015, just after Rachel Notley was elected.

Medicine Hat MLA Bob Wanner said even though it’s easy to target minimum wage as the direct reason why businesses are struggling, that’s probably not the case.

“There are a lot of facts that are around this issue,” explained Wanner. “It’s somewhat simplistic at times to say there’s one factor that’s influencing it. But, I think the record would show and the evidence would show that, that kind of a policy has its limitations.” 

Wanner says the data that he’s seen states in Medicine Hat, about 80% of the people in minimum wage jobs are between the ages of 20-64. 

In addition to that, Wanner said the Industry Profiles Accommodation and Food Service statistics, showed that the industry grew 18% in 2018.

“I just encourage people on both sides of the argument to look at the evidence, the data and then come to a conclusion after discussing the matter with various points of view.” 

So, with all the discussion regarding minimum wage, we can expect a lot more debate once the election is called.