Nearly half of Ontario’s 60,000 public service employees are set to return to the office full time next week, marking a major shift away from pandemic-era hybrid work and adding to a broader trend reshaping downtown Toronto.
Beginning Jan. 5, tens of thousands of Ontario Public Service (OPS) workers who had been working remotely part of the week will be required to work in person five days a week. They will join employees from major banks, technology firms, and telecommunications companies who have also been ordered back to the office in recent months.
Data from Statistics Canada shows the shift away from remote work has been gradual but consistent. For the fourth straight year, the share of Canadians working mostly from home has declined. As of May 2024, about 76 per cent of Toronto workers were commuting to a physical workplace.
End of hybrid work for OPS employees
OPS employees have had flexible work arrangements since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Many worked remotely for most or all of 2020 and 2021, before being required to return to the office at least three days a week in 2022.
In August, the provincial government announced that employees not already working full time in person—roughly half of the OPS—would be required to attend the office four days a week starting in October, rising to five days a week in January.
The government said the policy reflects current workforce realities, with Premier Doug Ford arguing that in-person work boosts productivity and mentorship.
“How do you mentor someone over a phone? You can’t,” Ford said at the time. “You’ve got to look at them eye-to-eye.”
Economic boost—or overdue correction?
Experts say the return of public servants could help revive parts of downtown Toronto that have struggled since the pandemic.
According to the Strategic Regional Research Alliance, average weekly office occupancy in Toronto stood at 82 per cent as of mid-November, still below the 92 per cent recorded before COVID-19.
Colin Mang, an economist at McMaster University, said the prolonged absence of office workers has had a noticeable economic impact.
“Because these workers have not been in the area, it’s led to basically a local economic depression,” Mang said, pointing to reduced foot traffic in the downtown core and the PATH system.
The province has echoed that concern. Ford has repeatedly cited struggling small businesses downtown as evidence that prolonged remote work has hurt local economies.