Canadian Mags

Come Monday, five unpaid interns at Toronto Life magazine will be out of work because of a visit this week by an inspector of the employment standards branch of the Ontario Ministry of Labour. St. Joseph Media has been told that under the provisions of the Employment Standards Act it can no longer offer four-month unpaid internships unless the interns are fulfilling a job placement requirement from a school of higher education. This is not the case for most interns at Toronto Life historically, although two of the current 7 interns qualify and will be staying on.

The ministry inspector also advised that, though he was starting with Toronto Life, the policy will be enforced later with other St. Joseph magazines and, indeed eventually, all magazines in Ontario.

There’s huge hope here — though a certain irony…

The media has finally been forced (by raw weight of public opinion) to speak to the reality that over a decade of using our youth as unpaid slave labour is a decidedly un-cool thing — and governments are finally taking action. Of course, they are starting with one of the worst offenders out there:

Yep, the media — specifically magazine publishers…