NDP Leader Jim Dinn is calling on government to acknowledge that the legislated minimum wage increase leaves many across the province living in poverty.

Dinn says that it took the provincial government five years to listen to workers and agree to increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour, and that since then record inflation and an increased cost of living has made it difficult for many workers to make ends meet.

He calls for a plan from the government that will force profitable employers to end the practice of using legislated poverty wages to exploit workers to protect the bottom line.

Dinn says that a worker at a grocery store earning minimum wage while working a full schedule should not have to choose between heating their homes and providing food for their families, noting that if someone is drowning two feet under water, raising them up by six inches isn’t going to save them.