LAWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

Hours of Work

Jan 1: Employers may now use either a calendar day or 24-consecutive hour period for Saskatchewan Employment Act work schedules, rest periods, and overtime requirements. Employers must list the formula they use to calculate a day for purposes of the Act’s work hours and wages requirements on required work schedule notices.

Action Point: Look up the maximum work hours and rest requirements in each part of Canada.

Payroll

Jan 1: Newly effective legislation, The Saskatchewan Affordability Act, provides for separate $500 increases to the basic personal exemption, spousal and equivalent-to-spouse exemption, dependent child exemption, and senior supplementary amounts in each of the next 4 taxation years. This is in addition to the annual provincial income tax indexation increases. For 2026, the BPA is $20,381.

Action Point: Find out about the 8 important new payroll changes that will affect your current year T4 filings and 2026 source deductions.

Leaves of Absence

Jan 1: New Saskatchewan laws limit an employer’s right to make employees provide notes from a doctor or other medical professional to verify their need for sick leave, maternity leave, interpersonal violence leave and bereavement leave.

Action Point: Find out about the rules determining whether you can ask sick employees for a doctor’s note and what you can do to verify health-related absences.

Termination

Jan 1: The threshold triggering an employer’s duty to provide notice of group termination under the Saskatchewan Employment Act increased from 10 to 25 or more employees. As before, employers must provide copies of the required group termination notice to affected employees, unions and the government.

Action Point: Find out how to comply with group termination rules.

New Laws

Jan 20: Effective today, energy sector service rigs drivers don’t have to obtain G-Endorsements to their licences to operate in Saskatchewan, provided that they’re Canadian Association of Energy Contractors (CAOEC) member drivers. The province also eliminated the rule requiring CAOEC service rig drivers to submit periodic medical reports to Saskatchewan Government Insurance.

New Laws

Jan 12: The Saskatchewan Advantage Innovation Fund (SAIF) and Agtech Growth Fund (AGF) are investing $2.197 million in 9 industry-led projects designed to help early-stage tech companies reduce risk and accelerate commercialization of game-changing technologies in agriculture, mining, energy, manufacturing and processing, and health care.

New Laws

Jan 19: The University of Regina will receive $1.96 million from the federal Prairies Economic Development Canada program to build the Small Modular Reactor Safety, Licensing, and Testing centre (SMR-SLT). The province will also contribute $4 million to the project to create the new testing facility dedicated to helping Canadian researchers and businesses safely develop and deploy next-generation nuclear technologies.

New Laws

Jan 21: The Governments of Canada and Saskatchewan are replacing the Forage Rainfall Insurance Program (FRIP) with Satellite Forage Insurance that will provide enhanced business risk management support for the livestock sector. Current FRIP customers will be automatically enrolled in Satellite Forage Insurance, which is available in high, medium and low coverage levels depending on soil zone.

Workers’ Compensation

Feb 28: That’s the final day for Saskatchewan employers to file their Employer’s Payroll Statement (EPS) listing their actual payroll expenses in 2025 and estimated payroll expenses for 2026. Remember that under new rules that took effect last year, corporate directors are no longer automatically covered by workers’ compensation and shouldn’t be listed in the company’s workers’ assessable payroll totals.

Action Point: Look up the 2026 workers’ compensation premium rates in each part of Canada.

CASES

Immigration: Recruiters Charged with Exploiting Foreign Nationals

Saskatchewan charged 2 employers with multiple violations of provincial immigration laws, including charging fees for employment, misrepresenting wages, benefits, length and other terms of employment, threatening deportation and taking unfair advantage of a foreign national’s trust [Vikram Singh and Harinder Sachdeva, Govt. Press Release, January 21, 2026].

Action Point: Find out about the 10 things employers need to know about hiring temporary foreign workers.