Let workers monitor distribution of tips

Re Susur Lee restaurants to return docked tips,

Aug. 29 Having spent four years volunteering on the campaign to get Ontario to pass a law banning the theft of tips and gratuities, I am encouraged and discouraged to see the Star’s recent report on the issue.

Despite a recent comprehensive review of the Employment Standards Act (ESA), Ontario persists with a substantially lower minimum wage for liquor servers, based on the assumption that those workers will get to keep their tips. Your recent report clearly shows that, nearly two years after the province passed the Protecting Employees’ Tips Act, there are still workplaces where tips are stolen from Ontario workers.

In situations where tips/gratuities are pooled and disbursed by employers, workers ought to have the legal right to monitor tip distribution. Without this practical safeguard, tip theft will always be a threat.

While I commend the effort by the Ministry of Labour last Christmas to embark on a public education campaign about the new tip law, the problem persists.

It seems obvious that an amendment is needed to the ESA to prevent tip theft by empowering workers to participate in the distribution of their own tips. Now is the time to investigate this widespread problem and push for preventative measures. Mike Vorobej, Ottawa Servers’ Association Protect schools from lawsuits Re When a schoolyard shove leads to a

$600,000 lawsuit, Aug. 30 This vexatious trend needs to be stopped. There are insufficient funds already without diverting enormous sums to the world of court action and countersuits.

Schools should be left to apply their conflict-resolution programs without being bullied by outsiders.

We need legislation to place schools, including playgrounds, outside the catchment domain of litigants. Hugh McKechnie, Newmarket