Sunshine List: These were Ontario’s highest-paid public sector employees in 2025

From left: Ontario Power Generation President Ken Hartwick, OPG CEO Nicolle Butcher, and OPG Chief Nuclear Officer Steve Gregoris. (LinkedIn)

More than 400,000 people have been included on this year’s “Sunshine List,” representing a seven per cent increase in the size of the list from one year prior.

Ontario released its list of all public sector employees who earned more than $100,000 in 2025 on Friday morning.

Ontario Power Generation President Ken Hartwick was once again the highest paid Ontario civil servant, bringing in $1,907,408 in 2025. OPG CEO Nicolle Butcher was second on the list earning a salary of $1,596,218 in 2025 while OPG Chief Nuclear Officer Steve Gregoris was third ($1,092,854.84).

In fact, the five highest paid civil servants in Ontario and seven of the top 10 were all employees of OPG.

Some of the other notable names on the list include Premier Doug Ford ($269,567), Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow ($240,349) and Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw ($445,366.) TTC CEO Mandeep Lali had a 2025 salary of $288,461.25 despite only taking over the job midway through the year on July 7.

This year’s list had 7,083 members of the Toronto Police Service on it, up from 6,114 in 2024.

While Denkiw was Toronto’s top paid cop, it was not by much with five rank-and-file officers that carried the rank of sergeant or constable earning salaries in excess of $350,000.

The seven per cent jump in the size of the Ontario sunshine list comes after a 25 per cent increase in 2024.

In a statement, President of the Treasury Board Caroline Mulroney said that “retroactive payments, collective bargaining outcomes and an additional pay period for multiple organizations were all unique factors contributing to salary increases in 2025″ and that more than 50 per cent of the growth in the list was “driven by municipalities.”

Mulroney also pointed out that more than 50 per cent of list is “comprised of public service organizations like school boards, hospitals and public boards of health, which in large part is comprised of nurses and teachers.”

Ontario has been releasing the names, positions and salaries of all public sector employees earning at least $100,000 in the previous calendar year since 1996.

The cutoff has not been adjusted for inflation. A worker earning $100,000 in 1996 would earn approximately $185,000 today, according to the Bank of Canada’s inflation calculator.

In 1996, only 4,502 public servants in Ontario earned enough to qualify for the sunshine list. Today, it is nearly 100 times that many.

In a statement provided to CP24, the President and CEO of the Association of Management, Administrative and Professional Crown Employees of Ontario (AMAPCEO) Dave Bulmer said that failure to adjust the list for inflation over the years has resulted in its “original intent and its enduring relevancy” being “completely lost.”

“Clearly, the list’s threshold needs to be adjusted to $185,000 – otherwise it will continue to capture salaries of workers who by 1996 standards would have been making $54,000. Its value barometer has literally been cut in half,“ he said. ”Likewise, given its objective was to cast sunshine on the province’s highest earning executives, save for those who fit that description, the List should otherwise be anonymized to protect the privacy of those in less senior roles."

Other names on the list:

• Ontario Premier Doug Ford - $269,567
• Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow - $240,349
• Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw - $445,366
• University Health Network President and CEO Kevin Smith - $939,603
• Metrolinx CEO Michael Lindsay - $327,439
• Peel Regional Police Chief Nishan Duraiappah - $604,449
• Opposition Leader Marit Stiles - $233,334
• University of Toronto President Melanie Woodin - $440,866
• Vaughan Mayor Steven Del Duca - $218,544
• Hospital for Sick Children President and CEO Ronald Cohn - $880,013
• Hamilton Health Sciences President and CEO Tracey MacArthur - $773,658
• Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown - $154,248
• Mississauga Mayor Carolyn Parrish - $156,170
• TMU President and Vice-Chancellor Mohamed Lachemi - $471,070
• Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre President and CEO Andy Smith - $757,366
• Toronto City Manager Paul Johnson - $523,925