REGINA – Opposition New Democrats were on the attack against the government over salaries of Saskatchewan Health Authority executive leadership on Monday.
At a news conference Monday, NDP health critics Meara Conway and Jared Clarke stood beside placards claiming that salaries of executive leadership had gone up almost $300,000.
That number was based on a total compensation reported of $6,083,334 for the year ended March 31, 2025, compared to $5,789,621 the previous year, according to numbers from the SHA’s 2024-25 annual report.
But the NDP didn’t stop there, as they singled out the compensation of four top executives CEO Andrew Will, COO Derek Miller, Chief Human Resources Officer Mike Northcott and Vice President Jim Billington.
Conway particularly targeted Billington for being a former Press Secretary to Premier Scott Moe, with an SHA salary of $257,640.
“He’s SHA communications and community engagement VP and he spends his days writing materials that downplay the real crisis in our health care system that is playing out right before our eyes,” Conway said.
“The example of Jim Billington in my mind really drives home the distorted priorities of this government. They are more interested in spin and damage control than delivering high quality health care for the people of this province.”
Conway pointed to the plight of frontline health care workers who she said had not gotten raises.
“What message does it send when nurses and other frontline health care workers have to stop at the food bank on their way home from a 12-hour shift while these senior executives get handed massive raises? Objectively, on every possible metric things are getting worse in health care in Saskatchewan. In the real world, if you don’t do your job, you don’t get a raise.”
In speaking to reporters later, Rural and Remote Health Minister Lori Carr said the NDP were being misleading.
“Well, I think when they talk about the additional compensation, they’re not being fully forthcoming with what that was for,” Carr said.
“That number accounts from several different avenues. One of them, she talked about the individual.:They’re comparing one year, he only worked half a year. The next year, he worked a full year. So, the second year actually reflected actual wages for a full year. There was vacation time payout that happened without that, that was quite significant. And there was also one executive that left that some severance was paid. And within that, there’s also the regular increases that happen, which are right in line with what our regular union members get when the band lifts go on. So, that’s what that increase is.”
Carr said that Conway was “making it sound like everybody was getting huge bonuses or something or a lot of extra money. But this is, the numbers that are reflected were being misrepresented in the House, is what she was doing.”
Carr also acknowledged that about a year ago there were management cutbacks at the SHA.
“So last year, we had done some administrative savings, and what we did was we took 26 people who were in managerial-type positions, administrative-type positions, and we ceased those positions,” Carr said.
“We took the savings from that, that was approximately $10.6 million, and we put it right into frontline care, and I believe that was 122 positions that we were able to put right on the frontline.”
Emergency motion attempt fails
On Tuesday, the NDP stepped up their attacks on the issue in the Assembly, as Conway moved an emergency motion to freeze wages for Executive Leadership members of the SHA until contracts had been bargained and signed with workers on the frontlines.
But the emergency motion needed unanimous consent under the House rules, and the government side voiced their opposition, ending the motion right there.
This was the second consecutive day that an NDP emergency motion attempt failed to get past the unanimous consent stage, after Kim Breckner’s attempted motion on child poverty was voted down Monday.
Afterwards Conway made known to reporters her disbelief at what transpired.
“I think whoever you talk to across this province they would agree that given the state of health care, this is an emergency situation, this is an urgent situation,” said Conway.
“Things continue to get worse every day. There’s a new story on the news, on the front page, that fills people with dread about when it’s their turn to rely on the health care system that the Sask Party is overseeing.”
