Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I wish to thank this committee for inviting us to talk about a subject close to our heart, the Canada-community agreements. I have prepared a presentation. I am told that I have 10 minutes to deliver it. It is entitled “Proud to serve our country”. I feel that the title accurately reflects what is happening on the ground. The phrase “proud to serve our country” is often used by the armed forces, and we consider ourselves an army that fights to develop linguistic duality in Canada. I wish to raise four questions.
The first question is the following: do the agreements adequately address the needs of communities in terms of funding, accountability, and priority management? Those are the three main elements.
With respect to funding, it is clear that we need more resources to better ensure development in various sectors and enable multiple stakeholders to work together. We conducted a study in Saskatchewan on how to distribute strategic funds. It is entitled “Le minimum vital”, the vital minimum. I will table a copy of this study with you later on. We sought to determine which organizations play a vital role in community development and to determine the minimum requirements for these organizations to effect change and community development. After this, we were not any further ahead. By giving organizations the minimum, we were still far from the real minimum they need.
There is a second issue pertaining to what I might call a sort of incompetence in planning human resources. We conducted another study on this subject and determined that staff turnover was approximately 60% at the regional level and 40% at the provincial level. Therefore, employees do not stay in these jobs. Over the span of two years, organizations undergo a total turnover of their employees. Organizations are constantly having to retrain people, and ultimately, employees accept to fulfil a role while waiting for something more important, while they train to do so. It is almost as though these people are occupying positions while waiting for something else to come along. Therefore, these people are not trained properly in community development, and come from all sorts of professional backgrounds. Once they have learned the job, they're gone. This is a significant problem that ties into funding.
With respect to accountability, governance suffers from a certain level of inconsistency. This means there is a lack of community governance, as well as inability to build it. There are several levels of governance, such as the provincial governance structure, the community governance structure, the economic governance structure, the cultural governance structure, and the early childhood development governance structure. There are no links to tie these multiple structures together. The Canada-community agreements program distributes funds, but there are other agreements do not relate to these particular structures. Therefore, there is a lack of accountability, or the accountability boils down to a small board of directors and we have still not come up with an overall development plan under which everybody is accountable. Therefore, this adds layers of complexity.
In terms of priorities, time allocated to development has decreased because of the administrative work required under the most recent agreement, appendix F, and so on. All organizations are trying to... Once again, I repeat, there are too few employees. Employees who deal with administration, which is becoming increasingly cumbersome, have less time to devote to development. Therefore, they produce fewer results, and so on and so forth. This is ongoing.
With respect to the agreements, there isn't any major difference between them. There is a sort of one-size-fits-all agreement that is applied all over the country, and you cannot really fine-tune these agreements or their negotiation according to specific contexts. We've invested a lot of energy in this, but there hasn't really been a change.
Therefore, the same question can be raised regarding administration costs. In Saskatchewan, we wonder why we cannot follow the model that is used in Nova Scotia. Nova Scotia did not sign an agreement and has received the same funding, but is not responsible for administration. Heritage Canada is responsible for administration, and the province is responsible for development. Does this address needs adequately? I would say that significant improvement still needs to be made on that front. That wraps up the first question.
I also want to talk about another element. Multi-year funding seems to have flattened out. Current funding has remained at the same level for the last five years. The cost of living and other factors are not taken into consideration. As such we are regressing; our ability to intervene is eroding.
What are the major disadvantages of these agreements? In addition to the elements I have brought forward, a governance without any real power, coupled with the need to ensure accountability is problematic. The absence of accountability and dispersion of resources among stakeholders who are under no real obligation to produce results creates undesirable situations. Incompetence is in a way encouraged. The absence of results has no consequences. Silos are created, resulting in a fear of collaboration, because everyone is clinging to their resources.
We absolutely have to change the perception that community organizations have to beg the federal government for money to carry out their mandate. We absolutely must be seen as partners, and not as beggars. We are asking for resources in order to move linguistic duality in Canada forward.
Administration is immensely heavy. Very often, we have to commit funds before even receiving them. In order to do community development today, organizations have to have some resources at their disposal. Most recently, we received funding from the Strategic Funds. The announcement was made in March, and yet we had to spend the money before the end of March. It is a case of hurry up and wait. It is rather difficult. In addition, we often have to wait for the 10% that only comes in June. Community development requires money. In order to progress, organizations must be able to maintain good relations and negotiate with financial institutions.
It is certain that there are advantages. It has been recognized that base funding is much appreciated, but not all organizations can benefit. Funding, paired with the immensely motivated community stakeholders, has indeed allowed us to produce results. I will table a document with you about the results achieved in the last five years, in spite of everything.
I wish to answer the question about what sort of recommendations should be made to the federal government so that government support to organizations is more effective. Firstly, I wish to refer to a report you already have: Leading by example and putting an end to the paradox. Ideally, Canada-community agreements or collaboration agreements should be tripartite. Saskatchewan, for one, would like these agreements to be entered into by the federal, provincial and community governments. To include the provincial government would be a demonstration of leadership.
The federal apparatus must be involved in community development. We have always signed agreements, which were called at one point the Canada-community agreements; they have since been renamed and are referred to as collaborative agreements. In fact, these agreements were mostly concluded with Heritage Canada. To produce real results, we need to sign agreements with the federal government on economic matters. Therefore, we need an agreement that involves a governance structure and accountability for results achieved. In addition, our communities would be able to benefit from the synergy created.
I'm talking about better collaboration between all parties and better delivery of services to our citizens. To my mind, one way of helping would be to make sure that the Official Languages Act is complied with. How many times have our organizations had to make sure that departments and government agencies complied with the Official Languages Act? How many times did our organizations have to confront the RCMP, Air Canada, and other organizations? We spend a lot of time making sure that the federal government adheres to the Official Languages Act, whether it be part IV, dealing with services, or part VII, that deals with promotion.