Ottawa mayoral candidate Jeff Leiper is promising to overturn return-to-office mandates for municipal employees and call on the federal government to reverse its four-day in-office mandate if elected this fall. Leiper unveiled a plan to “restore flexible work” at Ottawa City Hall on Monday, nine weeks before voters head to the polls in the municipal election. The City of Ottawa required all municipal employees to be in the office five days a week as of January 1. The city had said approximately 85 per cent of municipal staff were already required to be on site or in the office five days a week before the new mandate was introduced. As of July 6, federal employees are required to be in the office for a minimum of four days a week. Leiper says he would “overturn blanket return-to-office mandates for municipal staff, and push back against federal in-office mandates.” “Which are costing people time and money while threatening an already-overburdened transit system.” The City of Ottawa expects an additional 65,000 trips a week into downtown Ottawa this fall as public servants return to the office. Leiper’s campaign says Sutcliffe voted in favour of sending City of Ottawa staff back to the office five days a week, and “with Sutcliffe’s support, the federal government forced hybrid employees back into the office four days a week as of June 2026.” “Sutcliffe’s back-to-office orders are costing people time and money,” Leiper said. “Higher childcare, gas, transit, parking and coffee costs hurt people. And every moment you’re stuck in transit is time stolen from your loved ones, and that hurts even more.” Leiper says if elected mayor, he would allow City of Ottawa staff “flexible work wherever that’s possible without compromising public spaces.” He said he would also call on the federal government to reverse its four-day mandate, and he would work with the federal government to “expand shared workspaces in Kanata, Orléans, Barrhaven and the south end.”' Speaking with CTV News Ottawa, Leiper said Statistics Canada data found 90 per cent of workers who work at home are “as or more productive than if they’re in the office.” “One of the commitments I’m making to the residents of Ottawa today is to reverse the city’s back to office mandate to give Ottawa city workers the ability to work from home, as the default position, subject, of course, to operational needs,” he said. Ottawa incumbent Mayor Mark Sutcliffe’s campaign said the management of municipal employees is the “responsibility of the city manager, not the mayor.” “Playing politics with Human Resources is counterproductive and performative, especially since the City’s current policy already provides flexibility for alternative work arrangements,” Sutcliffe’s campaign said in a statement. “Ottawa needs leadership focused on delivering on real priorities—like improving transit, building housing, strengthening the local economy, and making communities safer.” Mayoral candidate Alex Lawson says he does not support the federal government’s four day a week in-office mandate. “As mayor, I’ll put Ottawa formally on record asking the federal government to reverse the four-day mandate,” Lawson says in the policy posted on his website. “Ottawa’s roads and transit carry the consequences of this policy.” He also said he would bring federal worksites outside the Greenbelt and restore rush-hour OC Transpo bus routes if elected mayor. Mayoral candidate Neil Saravanamuttoo told CTV News Ottawa “Ottawa is not ready for RTO.” “We don’t have the transit system. We don’t have the parking. We don’t have the road capacity,” Saravanamuttoo said. “As Mayor, I would have asked the federal government to delay their plans. We’re not ready as a city.”
