Nunavut could get its own 'Sunshine List'

The Nunavut government is working on legislation to disclose employees' salaries,says the deputy minister of Executive and Intergovernmental Affairs.

Ontario was the first province to release a "Sunshine List,"naming public sector employees who earn $100,000or more each year. Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Nova Scotia have all followed suit. Newfoundland and Labrador's government says it plans to introduce legislation this fall.

But Nunavut's"Sunshine List"would likely name public servants making more than $100,000a year.

"At first blush, I think the floor would be slightly higher, but that's undetermined as of yet," Chris D'Arcy told CBC News.

"For us, we're just going to have to see because of our salary structure where the appropriate cut off point is where we would give full disclosure of people's salaries."

"We would want to be careful not to raise that bar so high or have the floor so high as to exclude everyone but deputy ministers, for example," said D'Arcy.

"We need to find what the best common ground is and obviously speak to cabinet about how they want to move forward on this."

MLAhappy

"Any time any government can be transparent, that's great," said Tununiq MLA Joe Enook.

Enook has asked for deputy ministers' salaries to be disclosed in the past.

"I just don't know how far or what categories should be included. But that's for them to decide and then we'll have a conversation on it."

Nunavut looking at Newfoundland and Labrador model

D'Arcy told MLAs at a standing committee hearing Wednesday morning that he is looking closely at the Newfoundland and Labrador model.

He says the province plans to release all public servant position and salaries, but not names, up to $100,000.Above that, the name of the public servant would be released.

D'Arcy says the government is hoping to include salary disclosure in legislation coming forward next year.