Status of Women Committee on Nov. 26th, 2007

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Are you going to hand the letter in?

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

I just did.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Okay.

[Nicole Demers, Bloc, Laval, QC]

The letter is addressed to the Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Go ahead, Ms. Mathyssen.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Basically, I made several requests. What I received back was that because of the $5 million in administrative savings and the workload pressures and the backlog, I could not get what I needed.

I made these requests in June. It's now November. As you know, under access to information these requests must be obliged in 30 days.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

I have a point of order.

Excusez-moi, madame Mathyssen--

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Well, just perhaps, if you could listen carefully--

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Patricia Davidson]

Madame Boucher.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Madam Chair, a point of order. We do not have a copy of the letter, which is also not in both official languages. We would at least like to have a copy before you ask a question. We ask that of everyone.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

The letter was sent by SWC. I'm simply showing a letter that I received from the department, so I don't think it's a particular mystery.

My question is this: if you're having difficulty coping with ATI problems, what else is the department having difficulty with? As well, when do you expect the ATI situation to be resolved? When in fact can I receive the information that I asked for in June?

[Clare Beckton]

I would have to look at the specific information, but in the past couple of years we have had a threefold increase in requests for access to information. In fact, already this year we've had double the amount we had in the first eight months of last year.

We currently have one person working on the ATI requests. Even though she works overtime, she is not able to keep up. I am well aware of that, and we are in the process of engaging a second person to assist her. It's very difficult to find people who have a lot of knowledge and experience in the access to information field, because they're so much in demand from every department.

We are working on it. I believe we are close to being able to hire someone who will be able to help the person working there.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Was an ATI person let go when the cuts were made?

[Clare Beckton]

Yes, that was part of the efficiency review cuts.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

So it isn't terribly efficient to have efficiency cuts, I see.

I have another question, and this is basically a three-parter. I'd like you to comment on the changes in terms of the mandate of the women's program. Why were the changes made? How were the changes helpful? And what's been the impact of these changes?

[Clare Beckton]

I'm afraid I won't be able to help you on the first one, on why the changes were made, because I wasn't here at the time. I think they were made so that there would be a more direct benefit for women. The decision was made that the funding should be going to directly benefit women.

How has it helped? Well, we have a number of recipients who can now focus on ensuring that the money is going to a direct benefit for women.

It has had an impact on groups this year, because as all of us and the groups are going through a transition, everyone is trying to see what the new criteria are. We have put that on the website, as I said. We've tried to put particular tools on the website to assist. We went through a learning process in the first round, and as a result of the evaluation of that first round, we have come up with additional tools to help the groups understand the criteria for the terms and conditions. That includes putting a model of a successful application online, as well as doing the training sessions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you.

We'll go to the second round now for five minutes.

Mr. Pearson will start.

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for coming to the meeting today.

We've been fairly concerned, many of us, as members, about the cuts to the regional offices. I am part of a steering committee that works with Canada's food banks. There's been a lot of malnutrition in the northern regions, so we're trying to find ways of working with food companies to get food to all these various areas. We've had our 10 major food banks--the one I'm in, in London, is part of it--trying to get food up there. We've been at this for a year and a half, and we've found that we're actually going to need maybe 20 or 30 food banks to do it.

Once we realized that we couldn't do it, we tried an Internet model. People could use the web to do it, but the vast majority of people didn't have the Internet. We tried to use the telephone, but the vast majority of people didn't have phones, so we tried to set up satellite phone links, and this was quite expensive.

I'm looking at this map, and as I think about what our food banks are trying to do, I look at what the Status of Women has here with three offices down in this part of the country and one in Alberta, in Edmonton. And there's all this.... I'm just trying to figure out how it can be efficient to do that. I'm wondering how you send people out to all these remote communities to determine the viability of the programs and what they're applying for.

It seems to me that with the cuts it's logistically impossible to carry out the mandate. As food banks, we're finding the same thing, and it's very frustrating to us.

I wonder if you could speak to that, because it doesn't seem to me that we can efficiently do it.

[Clare Beckton]

This, as you know, is the first year we're operating with four regional offices, and we have not yet had full staffing. We did receive some funding under the supplementary estimates, which is the subject of this meeting today, which will add more resources, or at least an additional resource, to each of our regional offices.

We know that we can't continue to operate the way we were operating with 16 regional offices. We have to use different tools to try to get the information to the groups, to go out to the groups. Our regional people will be travelling as much as they can to go out and to meet with various groups. We have been bringing groups together in different communities to do these training sessions. We do work through the telephone, through these kinds of conferences.

I think it will take us a year or more to be able to fully assess the impact of the cuts and the impact of having four regional offices—

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you. Sorry to interrupt, but I don't have much time, and I want to turn it over to Ms. Neville.

Why wasn't it going to work, having 16 offices as opposed to four? You just said it wasn't going to, that changes had to be made. Why is that?

[Clare Beckton]

Well, I don't think I said it wasn't going to work. Again, I wasn't here when the decisions were made, so I'm not privy to all the discussion that went on.

I think some of the regional offices out there were operating with people alone, and not necessarily getting the best efficiencies, where you have people who come together to share skill sets.

Also, I think when some of the offices were set up, we didn't have some of the Internet tools that we have today and that certainly facilitate access for many groups to get information. We're working on expanding our own website to make it much more user-friendly over the next year.

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Ms. Neville, you have about a minute and a half.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you. I have so many questions.

I'd like to pick up on Mr. Pearson's comments. I have a whole bunch of my own, but it might have to wait for another time.

You're talking about Internet access. You just saw a map of the country that is not being served. There is no Internet access there. Are you keeping track of the additional travelling costs you are incurring in order to travel to meet these needs?

We know, anecdotally, that so many of the offices valued the coordinator who was in the office to provide guidance for getting through a government form and whatever. How are you making that up? What are you doing to assist people? My concern is for the low socio-economic groups who may not have the same access to the Internet.

I haven't got a lot of time, but you referenced that you have another 60 in the queue to come out of 200-plus applications, and I want to know what kind of organizations were refused funding and why they were refused funding.

[The Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Ms. Beckton, please give a very succinct answer. I have to move to the next round.