Human Resources Committee on Oct. 16th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Seeing no further discussion on Madam Zarrillo's amendment, I'm going to call a recorded vote.

(Amendment agreed to: yeas 11; nays 0 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

(Motion as amended agreed to: yeas 11; nays 0 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

Mr. Aitchison's amended motion has been adopted unanimously by the committee and will be reported to the House.

With that, I will return to the committee's study on the Canada summer jobs program with the officials. We will now go to Mr. Aitchison for six minutes.

[Scott Aitchison, Conservative, Parry Sound—Muskoka, ON]

I'm going to give my time to Mrs. Gray.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

You can give it to whomever you choose.

Mrs. Gray, you have six minutes.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

That's great. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

We'll probably only get one full round in.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Okay. That's great. Thank you so much.

Thank you to the officials for being here today.

Has the minister given you any directives regarding the Canada summer jobs program?

[Frances McRae]

Mr. Chair, this program is managed by the department, as you know, and we do seek decisions from the minister on the parameters of the program on an annual basis.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Is that something that you would be able to table for this committee during the duration of this study?

[Frances McRae]

Mr. Chair, I believe it's well understood that advice to the minister is not something that we share with committees.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Okay.

Do you track Canada summer jobs inquiries, issues and complaints that may come in from both employers and applicants?

[Frances McRae]

I'm going to turn to my operations colleagues to answer the specifics of the tracking.

I will say that we do have significant conversations both with members of Parliament and with applicants who may, for example, require additional information on their applications. This is a routine part of the work in managing the application process.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

If I may, just without getting into the weeds as to what those specifically might be, could you say, for example, that you've had this many concerns on this topic, this many concerns on that topic, or this many questions? That's sort of what I am looking for. If possible, could you table for this committee, before the end of this study, any of that analysis that you might have on how you might track the incoming inquiries and issues that come in? Is that possible?

[Frances McRae]

I can answer that, Mr. Chair.

The queries that we get are very specific to the actual applications in almost all cases, so they would be things like “We have this additional piece of information that we'd like to provide to you.”

We do have, as we talked about, the surveys that are mandatory for employers and that are voluntary for the youth. I can certainly give you numbers about satisfaction levels and the views—at the employer level—of the roles that the youth played in terms of their operations. We're happy to share those.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Great. Thank you very much for that.

Have you made recommendations to the minister on ways to reduce red tape on the Canada summer jobs program?

[Frances McRae]

In fact, every year we do look at how we could become more efficient. I will maybe add for context that the program operations branch that manages the Canada summer jobs program actually also manages a wide range of programs. Over 40 programs are run at ESDC, and 70 unique program streams. When we provide advice on efficiency, we do consider how that efficiency can be distributed across the programs.

I would just say that it's our objective to make sure we get the material out and the program launched as early as possible, as early as we can. Certainly we do talk about efficiencies as we run the program in terms of making sure that we can get answers out to employers as soon as we can.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Great. Thank you.

Are you able to table for this committee some of those internal recommendations or objectives that your department might be working on regarding the administration of this program?

[Frances McRae]

Mr. Chair, as I mentioned before, any recommendations that we would make to the minister or any advice that we would provide in terms of efficiencies or other recommendations on the program are not documents that we can table.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Okay. Thank you.

What are your service standards for responding to questions? What are your service standards specifically for timelines in responding to questions that might come in from employers?

[Frances McRae]

From employers and MPs, we do have very specific processes. In particular, our Service Canada offices regionally are very much in touch with all 338 members of Parliament. As you can imagine, there are questions that come in during the application period—

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

But what are the service standards and response times? A lot of departments will have certain response time service standards. Are you meeting those service standards?

[Frances McRae]

I will turn to my colleagues in terms of timelines, but I would just say two things: One, we run very well-attended information sessions every year for members of Parliament—

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

Right. I just want to focus on this. My time is almost up.

[Frances McRae]

On the questions, it depends on the complexity, I would say.

[Tracy Gray, Conservative, Kelowna—Lake Country, BC]

If I may, we're hearing that it takes anywhere....

I had a constituent from my riding reach out—I have a copy of the email—and say that it took a month to have a response back to a question they had. We have heard from other business groups that it takes up to three months to get a response back from the department on a very simple question.

Whatever information you can provide and table for this committee on what your service standards are and if they are being met would be very helpful.

[Frances McRae]

Go ahead, Damon.