Fisheries Committee on April 12th, 2016

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

I've seen in some of the information prepared by our researcher today that Unifor is recommending seven-person support per position in the new Victoria base. That seems high to me.

How might this compare to a similar situation in the private sector, as far as number of staff per position?

[Jody Thomas]

There isn't really a private sector equivalent, but that study of seven persons was done in 2003 and I'm not sure what the methodology was for it. The standard that we're using now is based on our 2009 workload study.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Which recommends how many per position?

[Mario Pelletier, Deputy Commissioner, Operations, Department of Fisheries and Oceans]

It depends on the size of the centre. For a centre the size of Victoria's, it is 5.5 employees per position.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

That's for one position, one desk.

[Mario Pelletier]

One desk at a centre like Victoria is 5.5. That's a multiplier of 5.5.

That's the same standard we use in our joint rescue co-ordination centre and other similar centres.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Further down in the information we were provided here, it's been indicated by Unifor that the relocation of staff and equipment to Victoria could cost up to $1 million.

Is there any equipment being moved with that, and if so, what would the cost of that equipment be? Moreover, how many FTEs would be involved in this $1 million?

[Jody Thomas]

I don't know where that number has come from.

Within the project budget, because this was a national project started in 2012, we estimated a one-time cost of $50,000 per employee for relocation.

There is equipment in Comox, but that's the banks of servers, the racks of computer equipment needed to power the back end. That's not the front-end modules, computers, and so on, that our operators use. They are in Victoria now.

As far as the relocation of employees, there's a fixed cost for that across government and we've applied that within the project.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

How many FTEs would be included in the move?

[Mario Pelletier]

In 2014, we went to the employees and nine of them confirmed their desire to relocate to Victoria. One of them is already retired; one of them has taken a job with another department; and the rest are using the workforce adjustment policy and are opting.

[Mel Arnold, Conservative, North Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

We heard earlier that you're having trouble finding staff or filling these positions.

Could you explain if there have been any delays in the hiring process or what they might have been?

[Supt Brian Bain]

I don't know what that's referring to exactly. I can say that we just mentioned the situation in Prince Rupert, and that we want to hire in Prince Rupert for Prince Rupert.

The other advantage of that is that the people who come from outside of Prince Rupert into the centre have expressed an interest in leaving the centre. In two cases, they've expressed an interest to go outside of the western region, and in other cases to go to Victoria. If we hire people in Prince Rupert for Prince Rupert and we have a few extra, which we will, then that will give the opportunity for others to go to other regions, or to the Victoria centre. That's part of the staffing plan.

The other thing we've noticed, which we were not anticipating, is that there have been some people from Vancouver and Tofino, which is already closed, and they were on—as was mentioned by the deputy commissioner—opting status. However, they discovered that they were unable to make it work, so they came to us asking if they could have a job.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Robert Sopuck]

Sorry, your time is up. You can elaborate perhaps during the next questioner.

Mr. Donnelly.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I'd like to thank the commissioner, Mr. Bain, and Monsieur Pelletier for your service to the Coast Guard and our country, and also thank you for your testimony here at the committee for this important study on the closure of this centre.

We've heard from earlier testimony that the Comox MCTS station is like a lifeboat to the others, Victoria and Prince Rupert, but we also heard testimony that anything that this committee produces in terms of a report or a recommendation is simply that, and that the Coast Guard is moving forward with plans to close, regardless.

I'm wondering if you could comment on that.

[Jody Thomas]

I'd like to refer back to the staffing, if I may, for one second—

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I'm sorry. I only have seven minutes.

[Jody Thomas]

Okay.

I'm not sure about the lifeboat analogy for Comox. I didn't hear it. I can review that quote and get back to you, if you would like. But the network as it's structured means that we will have zones within the Prince Rupert and the Victoria stations that will monitor specific areas, just as if the Comox station were still open.

So there's no diminution of service from that perspective. If the people who learned about Comox don't move to Victoria and take up their new duties there, we will train new people in the local knowledge that's required for the Comox area. That's what we do everywhere across the country as we hire new employees. Nobody comes to a station knowing a specific geographic area in the detail that is needed to do this job. We train people to do that.

In terms of the outcomes of the study, I think Mr. Pelletier would like to clarify that statement because we did hear it being made.

[Mario Pelletier]

Yes, thank you. Indeed, when I called Mr. Hughes to inform him of our intention to close the MCTS, as per the plan, he asked about the study done by this committee, and I agreed that every recommendation would be looked at and duly assessed. But meanwhile, we need to have a plan. The technology is ready to go. The staff has been waiting to know a little bit, and the busy summer season is coming as well, so we need to move forward. We need to have a plan, and if some recommendations can change this plan, we'll assess them.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

So even though the government has indicated that they want to review this decision, you're saying that you're going to go ahead with plans? You've already provided notice to workers that their jobs are gone there. How is that consistent? What are you going to do with this report and these recommendations? What if the recommendations say to keep the centre open?

[Mario Pelletier]

We can speculate as much as we want. We'll assess the recommendation and we'll evaluate the impact that it has on the decision. The employees were notified back in 2012 when it was announced that the station was going to close. In 2014, once we accepted the software, we communicated the time frame during which we intended to close the station. It was known back then, in 2014, that it was to close in the spring of this year.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

The employees at Comox were notified two weeks ago.

[Mario Pelletier]

Of the specific date of May 10, yes. But in 2014, they were notified that the consolidation with Victoria would happen in the spring of 2016.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I'm not sure we'll even have the recommendation by that date.

In terms of the transmissions, we've heard a lot about the echoey transmissions. I'm wondering if the minister has actually heard live transmissions versus recordings.

[Jody Thomas]

The minister, I believe, has been to MCTS centres, and so, yes, he has heard transmissions.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

So he's heard these echoey transmissions as early as when?