Content area
Full Text
TORONTO--Construction companies are cheating the provincial Workplace Safety and Insurance Board out of millions of dollars each year.
That's the startling accusation made this week in a brief presented by the Council of Ontario Construction Associations to the standing committee on finance and economic affairs.
According to the association, the board is losing between $100 million and $300 million each year because some construction firms are not accurately revealing the number of employees they have on payroll.
The association-which serves as a voice for the nonresidential construction industry--also maintains the province is losing up to $1.5 billion in taxes annually because wages of workers are not declared.
"It's obvious that somebody is ducking something," association president David Surplis said in an interview Tuesday. "They're going to need a whole pile of people to track something down that big."
Surplis said there's always been concern that some companies cheat the system, but the association is alarmed at the recent figures.
Research done by the association showed that less than half of the payroll in construction was reported to the insurance board in 1996.
For that year, Statistics Canada reported there...