Evidence of meeting #49 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was inmates.
A recording is available from Parliament.
11:05 a.m.
Liberal
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
That I'm going to bind every member of the committee to--
11:05 a.m.
Liberal
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Let's hear that your side is going to allow it to come to a vote today.
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Liberal
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
I'd like your assurance, sir, that your side will allow it to come to a vote today. How else could we proceed?
11:05 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Could the committee confirm with the chair that by the end of the day we will come to a vote on this matter?
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
11:05 a.m.
Conservative
Chris Warkentin Conservative Peace River, AB
We have several things on the order paper that I think are important for us to have a conversation about as well. We've got to set our schedule moving forward, so let's give an appropriate length of time.
11:10 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
My sense of the direction of the committee is, one, we postpone it until the end of the day; two, we give at least ten minutes; and three, it comes to a vote before the end of the day.
Can I assume that, as we are all honourable ladies and gentlemen?
11:10 a.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
11:10 a.m.
An hon. member
Not.
11:10 a.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
11:10 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Someone inserted the “not”.
Colleagues, thank you for that guidance to the chair.
On behalf of the committee, I'm pleased to welcome Mr. Shugart and his colleagues, who I'm sure he'll introduce. I know Mr. Shugart is familiar with parliamentary procedures. He has an opening statement.
The floor is yours, Mr. Shugart. I assume, as I say, that you will introduce your colleagues.
11:10 a.m.
Ian Shugart Deputy Minister, Department of Human Resources and Skills Development
Thank you very much, Chair.
I am joined today by Ms. Gina Rallis, who is our assistant deputy minister, human resources services; Ms. Carolina Giliberti, who's the senior ADM for service management in Service Canada; and my chief financial officer, Mr. Alfred Tsang.
I am very happy to have this opportunity to speak to you about the approach the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development has taken to meet the target of the operational budget freeze set by the government.
We are in a period of financial restraint, and we know in the department that this restraint is going to be a way of life for us for some period of time. Our integrated business plan takes this into account.
The integrated business plan aligns human resources and financial management to ensure that all of our key activities and initiatives support our broad objectives and priorities—for example, our 2010-2013 plan identified judicious technology upgrades and streamlining of processes as key elements that would help the department maintain its service standards in a context of fiscal constraint.
My department is now faced with an important challenge: we have to find ways to maintain levels of service and carry out the will of our ministers and of Parliament, while staying within our reference levels. How are we going to do this? In response, allow me to put things into context.
In 2009, in order to cope with the increase in the volume of claims for employment insurance because of the recession, the department had to hire and train temporary personnel, redistribute the workload across the country, recall employees who had recently retired, extend overtime hours, open employment insurance call centres on Saturdays, and speed up the automation of claims processing, among other measures. Because we knew the need would not be permanent, our strategy also included a gradual approach to managing the reduction of human resources as the economy improved. This is already happening, as the number of temporary employees is steadily declining.
Our reference levels, of course, are voted by Parliament, and I have to make sure we hire the necessary people to provide the wide range of programs and benefits and services we're responsible for within that context. Aligning our workforce more closely with our operational needs is only one element of our approach. Moving forward we will need to look at our workforce needs and develop our plans in light of those operating budget restrictions.
This is why, for example, we have a workforce management strategy of which vacancy management is an important component. In the department as a whole, we foresee that during the 2011-12 fiscal year, some 950 employees appointed for an indeterminate period will retire and some 750 will move to another department or leave for other reasons. Therefore, attrition will be a factor in reducing the size of our workforce and this will give us some flexibility. Decisions to staff the resulting vacant positions will be made according to the needs before us.
In an environment of financial restrictions, it's clear that we must concentrate our efforts on our core business. And this, while modernizing our service delivery, streamlining our operations, improving our skills and functioning more efficiently. Technology is helping us do more with less. It's allowing us to serve more Canadians more quickly and efficiently than ever before. It's one of the keys to maintaining our service standards.
Automation of simple processes and internal transactions and standardization of business processes and procedures are also helping us get more value for money. I refer to savings we've achieved on travel and hospitality costs by relying more on video conferencing, for example. For our department, the ceiling for travel, hospitality, and conferences is $59 million. Because of our efficient use of new technology, we foresee spending only $54 million.
We've developed a systematic approach to performance management to ensure efficient delivery of service to Canadians. We have established a national workload system for employment insurance to ensure quality and consistency of service delivery across the country. We will keep automating and modernizing our service delivery system for other benefits.
However, becoming more efficient will not help us reach our objectives unless we can manage to build and maintain what I've called internally in the department a three-D workforce that is composed of employees who are devoted, dynamic, and deployable. In order to get results for Canadians, we need to attract and retain talented public servants and maximize their potential; we need to establish a healthy, enabling workplace; we need to strengthen and encourage leadership and innovation; and we need to invest in professional development.
Finally, I would like you to bear in mind that we have just completed an overall review of our general and administrative expenditures. We did this to improve efficiencies and service to Canadians; we're thinking of the future.
We've also developed an internal communication strategy to ensure that we've got the understanding and the support of our employees with regard to the management of our human and financial resources.
I want to assure the committee of our commitment to aim for excellence in everything we do and to respond to the needs of Canadians. Our commitment is to serve Canadians, our obligation to Parliament is to do so within our reference levels, and in that spirit, I welcome your comments and your questions.
Thank you very much, Chair.
11:15 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
Thank you, Mr. Shugart.
I'm turning to Mr. Regan for eight minutes, please.
11:15 a.m.
Liberal
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Shugart, thanks to you and your colleagues for coming here today, and thank you for generally addressing in your opening statement the real topics we're discussing here at this committee in this study, because looking at how departments are going to manage the kinds of spending restraints that we put on you at a time when you're facing various challenges is an important question for Parliament to understand and for us to examine as we look at approving expenditures by the government.
I must tell you that I have the utmost respect for our civil service in Canada. In view of this, it seems to me that you've been put in an awful position by this government and the kind of spending spree it's been on since it came into office.
We've seen federal spending under the current government grow from $175 billion in 2005-06 to $245 billion in 2009-10. That's a remarkable growth in spending. In fact, in the last two years we've seen record deficits of $45 billion and $56 billion respectively, making it obviously challenging for departments like yours.
The IMF and the Parliamentary Budget Officer both say that the country has a structural deficit. This, of course, is in contrast to what the finance minister wants Canadians to believe. We have the Treasury Board president talking about solving their mismanagement of our country's fiscal matters through attrition rates in excess of 11,000 persons a year, but the government's own departmental reports on priorities and planning identify only 1,133 staff reductions.
We're told there's a plan to dig the country out of the massive hole the Conservatives have put us in, but all the Treasury Board president is able to produce is a single sheet--and I have a copy of the lovely sheet he had the other day before the committee. I'm not laying my hands on it quickly, but he was holding up two sheets, saying this is our plan. In fact, it was one single sheet translated into French and the other one that simply tallies up the spiral of deficit the government has in mind over the next five years. In view of that background, all departments find themselves in a very difficult situation.
But let me ask you another question to start. The question is, have you ever had a minister take a document received from you as senior civil servants in your department and change it or doctor it to make it look like you approved something or recommended something when actually you recommended the opposite?
11:20 a.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Human Resources and Skills Development
I have signed many memoranda to ministers over the years, Chair, and I've received varied responses--
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
February 15th, 2011 / 11:20 a.m.
Conservative
Paul Calandra Conservative Oak Ridges—Markham, ON
Perhaps Mr. Regan can help me understand how that's relevant to the topic of budget freezes.
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John McKay
As reluctant as I am to agree with Mr. Calandra, if you could bring this down to some relevance to this particular....
11:20 a.m.
Liberal
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Mr. Chairman, we're looking at how the minister of the department performed and how this department handles these sorts of things. The question is, if we're having ministers mislead us on material on how they handle things, it's important for us to know that.