Finance Committee on June 14th, 2006

[Michèle Demers]

Who paid Deloitte?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Yes, but presumably there is an issue. Presumably, the employer decided to pay the folks, and I'm assuming you had a chat with them at the point of their investigation. Is that fair?

[Betty Bannon]

I was interviewed, yes, and Shane was, as well.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Presumably, you made the point that you're making here today.

[Shane O'Brien]

Maybe I could answer that question for you. The mandate for Deloitte & Touche was actually set by the agency; they had a very narrow mandate. They were to look at the assessment of staffing and recourse as defined within the agency's policy.

In answer to your question about subsection 54(2), there was a rationale. I had raised this when we had preliminary discussions prior to the CCRA coming into being. Prior to the agency coming into being, with the proclamation of the act in 1999, we were governed by a piece of legislation called the Public Service Employment Act. There was a public service watchdog called the Public Service Commission, which monitored staffing throughout the public service to ensure that there was no favouritism, there was no nepotism, that there was no bias in the staffing system, and that it was a rules-based approach.

When they put in subsection 54(2), the agency also repealed the Public Service Employment Act. When the Public Service Employment Act was in previously, we never had the right to bargain it, but we had the watchdog when there were problems. Now the agency gets to act as accused, judge, and jury under their own process. They create their own process; they're their own watchdog; the complaints about their processes are heard and decided by their managers, or the reviewer is appointed by them. That's why that's in there.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Thanks, Mr. O'Brien.

We'll go to Mr. St-Cyr.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

My question is for both groups of witnesses.

I would like to come back to the matter of centralization, be it in terms of staffing, operations or decision making. The answer that Ms. Bannon provided earlier was from a union point of view, and explained how employees would be affected.

Personally, I would like to know whether there will be repercussions in terms of customer service. Would there be a higher standard of customer service if offices, and decision-making powers, were decentralized? Will centralization affect regional jobs?

[Réal Lamarche]

This is a real problem for agency employees. We often hear them say that they are being prevented from providing services that they were previously able to offer. This clearly shows that there is a real risk of a decline in service standard. That is why we are against this change. Some reorganizations involve minor and logical change; however, this is an example of significant restructuring. Our members want to provide services to Canadians, and in order to do so, believe that power should remain with their individual offices. That is what the agency's employees want.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

Could you please tell us your view?

[Betty Bannon]

Certainly the internal centralization of compensation would have no impact on the taxpayer.

On the call centres, whether I call Ottawa to get my question answered or whether I call Shawinigan I don't think has much bearing. However, what I heard from the previous group, and they were right, is if you call on Tuesday the person you're talking to may be in Toronto, and when you call another time they may be in Vancouver. When there's a heavy volume, the calls bump to the next site, also because of the time zones. That could very well create a problem for the taxpayer.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

A lot has been said about the way in which the agency is managed. As regards the act, you have suggested that we strike one of the clauses dealing with negotiation. Do you have any other suggestions to make to the committee concerning changes that should or should not be made? I would like to hear from both groups.

[Réal Lamarche]

On the subject of amending the act, I would like to point out that, were it possible to negotiate staffing and recourse, we would at least be able to sit at the table to raise matters of concern and express the viewpoint of members of the institute. At the moment, no such dialogue occurs. Consultation amounts to sending us a piece of paper, but at the end of the day, the issues are not up for negotiation, and those people do exactly as they please.

We have a specific, more technical recommendation relating to what I call “The grandfather clause”. In 1999, it was formerly recognized that all employees had the necessary skills to do their job. However, the skills profile pertaining to their position was not recognized. If, in 1999 the agency had recognized it, we would not be in this mess. Now, employees are having to again prove that they are qualified for their own job.

With a grandfather clause, the agency would be able to recognize that an employee satisfied the skills profile of his or her job. If somebody wished to seek a promotion, it would be a matter of assessing whether he or she had the relevant skills for the job in question. We made this recommendation in 1999, and have probably repeated it a dozen times a year since then. However, we have no such powers thus far. If the act were amended to allow staffing to be negotiated, we would be able to make headway on such matters and submit allegations.

At the moment, we have no power on matters relating to staffing and recourse decisions. Even managers agree with us that, in the majority of cases, the unwieldy nature of the process prevents them from appointing the best possible candidate. If we were granted certain rights, we would be able to sit at the negotiation table and be heard. I believe that we would be able to suggest constructive measures to fix the current chaos.

[The Chair, Conservative, Brian Pallister]

Thank you.

I am sorry sir, but your time has expired.

Mr. Del Mastro.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, everyone, for coming today.

It's worth noting one of the things the CFIB just indicated in their presentation: with the creation of the CRA, people are actually a little bit more satisfied with the process, they're a little bit happier, and certainly your membership would share in the fact that people are a little bit more satisfied with the services they're receiving. So I commend your members for that.

I want to come back to this issue of recourse, because in your conclusion, the Deloitte & Touche review indicated the recourse process would be predicated on a system of fairness and natural justice. Are you indicating you don't believe those two principles exist right now?

[Michèle Demers]

Yes, we are indicating that, because it's too cozy, too in-house. We don't consider it an independent third-party review process, and it's not used consistently.

I would just like to add one thing that reaches out to a question asked previously. The CRA pride themselves on being trendsetters because they brought forward a new staffing regime, a new recourse regime, a new entity distinct from Treasury Board, although the financial tie is still very strong. They did make strides in establishing forums for consultation for employee representatives. They have tried to make the staffing more efficient, and it doesn't work.

If they want to continue with that impression of themselves--that they are trendsetters--they could go a step further and say, “Yes, we are a separate employer; why don't we establish a process by which we could bargain staffing and recourse?” They could be even more distinct from the rest of the public service.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Okay. Do you have anything you wanted to add, Ms. Bannon?

[Betty Bannon]

Yes. On the recourse of being fair and transparent, I don't think it is, because in our minds it's not recourse at all. With any change to the act, rather than a deletion of subsection 54(2), I would prefer it to be amended to read that staffing and staffing recourse may be bargainable, rather than delete it and have it silent.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Just to foster my understanding, are most of the problems associated with recourse around promotions or appointments?

[Betty Bannon]

Yes.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

They are. Okay.

In your feeling, promotions are not being rewarded as dictated by the CRA.

[Betty Bannon]

The recourse for those who are not....

When you qualify for a position you're in a pool, and there could be 30 people in that pool. Then they make selection criteria to pick people out of the pool to give them a job. Where we have the difficulty is, why did you pick that one and not that one? When you try to exercise your recourse rights, it doesn't always come out very clearly why that happened. Then nobody ends up being satisfied with it. That's the kind--

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Would you prefer a system of seniority-based advancement?

[Betty Bannon]

Well, that would be unheard of in the public service, but it's not a novel idea.

[Shane O'Brien]

In 1999 we advanced the position based on a level of not just seniority, but skills and seniority. If you look at most private sector unions, that's what they have. We were not even advocating a pure seniority, because we do recognize there has to be a level of competence to do the job, and from that the most senior person should be chosen.

I just want to add to Betty's previous comments. I'll give you a quick analogy--and very quick, because I know we're running out of time--to help you understand. There's not just one level of recourse; there are three levels of recourse in the agency.

At 11 o'clock this morning I attended one on a promotion in headquarters. Without getting into names, there was a case where three people were chosen and the person I was representing wasn't chosen for a job. We exercised recourse with the appropriate manager, and the first question we asked was, “What qualifications did you use to appoint them?” The answer we got was, “Additional qualifications linked to work-specific requirements.” We said, “What does that mean?” They said, “Well, we don't really know, but that's what human resources told us to say.” We said, “Can you tell us what qualifications those candidates had that my client didn't have?” “We can't discuss that because that's covered under the Privacy Act; we're not prepared to discuss it.”

When we asked some other questions, the meeting was terminated abruptly, and I was told to speak to human resources. That's recourse in the agency.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Thank you.