Toronto City Councillors Give Themselves 24% Pay Raise
Toronto is falling apart at the seams. People can’t afford basics like rent or groceries. Homelessness and tent cities are exploding. The TTC doesn’t work, breaking down and closing huge sections of the subway line on a daily basis. Even the snowplows don’t work. But never fear, city councillors are hard at work on the important things, like voting to give themselves a 24% pay raise.
How tone deaf can you get? Unlike politicians and CEOs, workers can’t vote to give themselves a raise. We’re constantly told there’s no money for basic social services much of the population relies upon, like public transit. But there’s always money to defend the interests of the ruling class, from increasing their own pay to lavishing money on police to repress protests and defend themselves against growing mass anger. Increasing the pay of city councillors will cost Toronto close to $1 million.
Bootlickers will protest that councillors have not received a raise since 2006, despite annual pay increases tied to inflation. To this I say: boo hoo hoo. Real wages for workers have been stagnant for decades. The average wage for a Toronto city worker is $76,900 per year. Meanwhile, city councillors before they hiked their own pay had an annual salary of $137,537. That has now increased to $170,588.
Any elected institution where officials enjoy salaries far higher than the people they represent is inevitably prone to corruption. How could it be otherwise? Those who benefit from the status quo are unlikely to rock the boat. Along with government office, we see this in trade unions and workers’ parties, where bureaucrats who earn higher salaries than rank-and-file members have a material interest in class collaboration with the bosses and discouraging militancy from below.
Elected officials should earn no more than an average worker’s wage and must be subject to immediate recall. In Toronto, that means city councillors should earn no more than an average city worker and can be recalled by their constituents at any time. Municipal councillors in the Paris Commune, the first workers’ government in history, operated precisely on this basis.
Having elected officials accountable in this way is a major difference between bourgeois and proletarian democracy. And it’s the only way to ensure democratic control from below and make city council work to improve the lives of the vast majority, rather than catering to the wealthy elite and further enriching themselves in the process.