NDP Leader Andrea Horwath promises an NDP government would raise the minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2016, while cutting small business income taxes from 4.5 per cent to three over the same period.

The tax cuts would cost the provincial government $270 million when fully phased in, Horwath said while campaigning for the June 12 election.

The promise mirrors the position the NDP took in February, after Premier Kathleen Wynne and then-minister of labour Yasir Naqvi announced an increase to the minimum wage of 75 cents to $11 an hour, indexed to inflation thereafter. By sheer coincidence, the minimum wage increase will take place on June 1, 11 days prior to the election.

Horwath confirmed the NDP would also index their increases to inflation, once they were fully phased in.

The Tories oppose any changes to the current minimum wage, saying it will kill jobs and raise costs to employers in a sluggish economy.

"It's been a long time since I've waited table, a long time since I've made minimum wage myself," said Horwath at a restaurant in east-end Toronto.

"Minimum wage jobs used to be a starting point, an entry into the workforce. Today, more and more people are relying on minimum wage jobs to pay their bills."

However, the NDP say small businesses need a break if they're going to have to absorb increases to the wages they pay workers.

Horwath made her announcement at Paintbox Bistro and Catering in downtown Toronto, a "social enterprise" that rents its space from a partnership between Toronto Community Housing and the Daniels Corp., the developer rebuilding Toronto's Regent Park social housing complex.

Chris Klugman, owner of Paintbox, pays his beer and wine servers minimum wage plus tips — which he does not divert for either management or owners, as some food-service businesses do. The NDP tried to prohibit such moves with a bill in the last session of the legislature.

"No, we don't tip-out here," Klugman told QP Briefing. "It's just so wrong, and it's a real problem for the industry."

Liberals present at Horwath's event distributed a news release accusing the NDP of killing their own bill (from MPP Michael Prue) that had all-party support. Prue's bill 49, the protecting employee's tips act, was passed by the Legislative Assembly Committee on Dec. 4 and rested on the order paper for the following five months until the house fell. Bill 49 could only have been called for third reading by the government.

Horwath assured reporters, standing next to a commercial-grade deli slicer in a cramped scrum in the kitchen of Paintbox that Prue's bill will return to the house one way or another.

"One thing people in the service industry can be guaranteed is NDP private member's bill is something they will see with an NDP government. They'll also see the minimum wage go higher than the Liberals are proposing."

Horwath makes minimum wage pledge a campaign promise

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