At the Miner's Village Restaurant in Glace Bay, N.S., the search is on for a new line cook, but filling the position has been a challenge.
“I did put a post on Facebook and unfortunately, as of right now, I haven't had one reply,” said restaurant manager Wilma MacAulay.
She says the position pays more than minimum wage, but as a small business it's hard to pay much more with costs continuing to rise.
“I’ve given the staff in the kitchen the minimum wage people have gotten, and it still keeps them above, but it's not great,” she said.
Just up the road at a food bank, the client list is growing rapidly.
Linda MacRae says she's seeing people working for minimum wage not being able to make ends meet.
“They're working 40 hours a week and they're coming in here and saying ‘Linda we need food because if we don't get it our power bill is going or rent.’ They just can't do it,” said MacRae, director of the Glace Bay Food Bank.
The minimum wage in Nova Scotia won't hit $15 an hour until April 2024.
MacRae says her clients can't afford to wait that long.
“Absolutely not, we need it and we need it now. With prices going up so high, we need something done now,” she said.
But despite the plea for action, Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston is reluctant to step in and immediately increase minimum wage.
“Anything that we do has to be sustainable,” said Houston. “And we have to make sure we can do it for the long-term without negatively impacting other government services.”
At the restaurant, MacAulay says increasing minimum wage would cut into profits, which she says are slim to begin with.
“I'm really praying that tourism will continue here because we could all be in trouble here. It could be a lot of people's last year,” said MacAulay.
