A central piece of the twentieth-century labor-capital compromise is disappearing in Ontario, as the government moves forward with omnibus legislation that will transform the province’s workers’ compensation system.

If Ontario’s Bill 105 becomes law later this year, it will herald the most significant overhaul of workers’ compensation in nearly three decades. On paper, the bill contains measures the government is presenting as improvements, including a modest increase in wage-loss benefits from 85 percent of pre-injury net earnings to 90 percent. It would also introduce a provision allowing some workers to receive compensation beyond the age of sixty-five if they can provide evidence of their intention to continue working, while extending mandatory coverage for some care workers.

But buried within the bill are changes that strike at a core principle: Workers who are permanently injured should be entitled to a measure of benefit security. It also introduces the possibility of significant offsets to wage-loss compensation from other publicly funded programs.