Hydro-Québec: he wanted his $625,000 bonus and he will get it!

Hydro-Québec is preparing to pay $625,000 to its executive vice-president of strategies and finances in order to “compensate” for the part of the annual bonus that he lost by leaving the Caisse de dépôt.

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CEO of Hydro since last summer, Michael Sabia recruited Maxime Aucoin in September 2023. The two knew each other at the Caisse: Mr. Sabia led the institution from 2009 to 2020 and Mr. Aucoin worked there from 2012 to 2023.

“A compensatory amount of $625,000 will be paid [à M. Aucoin] on July 4 if he is still employed by Hydro-Québec on that date. This sum is equivalent to the portion of the bonus for the year 2023 not paid by his previous employer,” explains the electricity giant in a response to a request for access to information from the Journal.

“This is a common practice in the industry,” we add.

“It’s true that it’s a fairly common practice,” particularly when a state-owned company wants to attract managers from the private sector, confirms François Dauphin, CEO of the Institute on Governance.

“What is rarer is that in this case, we attract someone from the public sector to the public sector, from one state corporation to another,” he adds, however.

“Transition allowances”

Maxime Aucoin also received “transition compensation” of $25,870 in March, indicates Hydro-Québec.

Three other new Hydro executives were entitled to such compensation: Jeanne Olivier, chief of staff to Michael Sabia ($52,800), Joël Thibert, vice-president of strategic planning ($50,000), and France Wong, vice-president of marketing ($50,000).

In 2018, however, Hydro’s internal auditor considered that the payment of hiring bonuses constituted a practice “directly contravening the incentive remuneration policy and the government decree adopted to this effect”.

At the time, it was estimated that Hydro-Québec had paid more than $30 million in hiring or retention bonuses to some of its executives over a period of approximately 20 years.

Jonatan Julien, then Minister of Natural Resources, had promised to put an end to these payments. “It’s over,” he said to the Journal.

Radio silence in Quebec

On Wednesday, the Legault government did not want to say whether Hydro had the green light to pay hiring bonuses.

“Hydro-Québec has the latitude to establish the overall remuneration of its employees in compliance with the laws in force and the frameworks approved by the board of directors, and can pay transition allowances and compensatory amounts to its employees,” said assured a spokesperson for the state-owned company, Caroline Des Rosiers, specifying that the board had approved the payment of $625,000 to Mr. Aucoin.

At Hydro, Maxime Aucoin is entitled to total compensation of approximately $800,000, while he earned more than $1.3 million at the Caisse in 2022.

The latter has paid, in recent years, “compensatory amounts” to several managers whom it recruited from the private sector. The CEO of the Caisse, Charles Emond, notably obtained $4 million in this capacity from 2019 to 2021.