Bill 44, Healthcare Staffing Agencies Act, 2025
Chamber
ontario
Stage
Introduced
This Ontario bill regulates healthcare staffing agencies by capping pay rates, banning employee poaching, and phasing out agency use in hospitals and long-term care homes.
Key Changes
- Hospitals and long-term care homes in municipalities of 8,000+ must create public plans to reduce and eventually eliminate spending on staffing agencies within 24 months
- New healthcare staffing agencies must operate as not-for-profit organizations
- Agencies cannot pay assigned workers more than 10% above the standard rate at the hospital or long-term care home
- Agencies are banned from poaching employees from hospitals or long-term care homes, with fines up to $1,000,000 for violations
- Agencies receiving more than $400,000 from the Ontario government face oversight by the Auditor General, Patient Ombudsman, Ontario Ombudsman, and Integrity Commissioner, and their employees must be listed on the Sunshine List
- Agencies cannot assign workers who left a hospital or long-term care home within the past 12 months in the same or adjacent Ontario Health Team region
Gotchas
- The bill requires all hospitals and long-term care homes to completely stop using staffing agencies after 24 months, regardless of local staffing shortages — there is no exception for facilities that cannot find enough permanent staff
- Only newly established agencies must operate as not-for-profit; existing for-profit agencies are not required to change their structure
- Fines collected from agencies that illegally poach employees must be directed back to hospitals and long-term care homes, not to general government revenue
- The 10% pay cap applies to what the agency pays workers, not necessarily what the agency charges the hospital — the relationship between agency fees and worker pay may still leave room for high agency markups unless further regulated
- The bill is currently at First Reading, meaning it has not yet been debated or passed, and its provisions may change significantly before becoming law
Who's Affected
- Hospitals and long-term care homes in Ontario municipalities with populations of 8,000 or more
- Healthcare staffing agencies (both existing and newly created)
- Temporary or agency healthcare workers (nurses, personal support workers, etc.)
- Patients in hospitals and long-term care homes during the transition period
- Ontario taxpayers and the provincial healthcare budget
Vibes
0 responses
Gotchas
- The bill requires all hospitals and long-term care homes to completely stop using staffing agencies after 24 months, regardless of local staffing shortages — there is no exception for facilities that cannot find enough permanent staff
- Only newly established agencies must operate as not-for-profit; existing for-profit agencies are not required to change their structure
- Fines collected from agencies that illegally poach employees must be directed back to hospitals and long-term care homes, not to general government revenue
- The 10% pay cap applies to what the agency pays workers, not necessarily what the agency charges the hospital — the relationship between agency fees and worker pay may still leave room for high agency markups unless further regulated
- The bill is currently at First Reading, meaning it has not yet been debated or passed, and its provisions may change significantly before becoming law
Summary
Bill 44 creates new rules for companies that supply temporary healthcare workers to Ontario hospitals and long-term care homes. It requires these facilities (in towns of 8,000 or more people) to develop public plans to gradually reduce — and eventually eliminate — their use of staffing agencies within two years. The speed of the phase-out depends on the size of the municipality, with larger cities facing stricter and faster limits. The bill also places restrictions on the agencies themselves. Any new agency created after the law passes must operate as a not-for-profit. Agencies cannot pay their workers more than 10% above what the hospital or long-term care home normally pays for that role. Agencies are also banned from recruiting (poaching) employees directly from hospitals or long-term care homes, and cannot assign workers who left a hospital or long-term care home within the past 12 months in the same or nearby health region. The bill was introduced to address concerns about the high cost of private healthcare staffing agencies, which have been criticized for draining public healthcare budgets and drawing workers away from permanent positions in hospitals and long-term care homes.
Automatically generated from bill text using Claude
Vibes
0 responses