Foreign Affairs Committee on May 21st, 2013

[Nadir Patel]

Let me just make a couple of comments on that—

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Just before I do that, sorry, you've done some study on the others. Would you acknowledge that they did wide consultations internally and externally when they were bringing forward their changes in the U.K. and in the U.S.?

[Michael Small]

To be candid, I haven't looked at that.

Vincent, have you?

They have different structures from what we are putting forward.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

They consulted widely. I guess I'll give you that. It's true.

[Vincent Rigby]

Mr. Chair, it's difficult to make generalizations about the extent of the consultations in individual countries. Consultations absolutely did take place. Whether they happened before the announcement to proceed with amalgamation, or after, I can't speak to that. Certainly—and I'm sure Nadir will speak to this, and Michael as well—as we move forward there will continue to be extensive consultations, I think, in terms of how this amalgamation comes together.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

It's after the fact, I might add, Mr. Chair.

Again, you're doing your job, but I'm pointing this out because this is the government's announcement in a budget bill. We're being told there was no consultation beforehand. My goodness, if you're going to do this, do it right. That's what our point is here.

Ms. Péclet might have a question. I'll leave it to her.

[Nadir Patel]

Chair, I have a couple comments on that—I'm sorry.

[Paul Dewar, NDP, Ottawa Centre, ON]

I think we're fine. Thank you, Mr. Patel. We're good.

[Ève Péclet, NDP, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

I will try to be brief.

Respect for human rights is a very important issue, and I hope it will remain a priority in the government's new policies, especially when it comes to corporate social responsibility. I am thinking of the tragic event in Bangladesh. I hope that the rules will be tightened and taken into account in the new policies.

That being said, I would like to know whether the amalgamation will result in any changes when it comes to the CIDA countries of focus.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Once again, could I get a quick response, Mr. Rigby?

[Vincent Rigby]

Sorry, when you said the target missions, do you mean the specific countries where we do activities? Yes.

Right now we have 20 countries of focus, and about 15 to 16 countries have a modest presence. Those certainly will not be changed because of amalgamation.

We're always looking at priorities and we're always looking at our countries of focus in terms of possible changes in country circumstances, or changes to broader government priorities. There's no direct linkage to amalgamation in that regard.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much. We're going to move over to Ms. Brown.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is very informative.

Gentlemen, in the bill it talks about transition teams. You've talked a little bit about that. I wonder if you could speak more to how this is going to roll through. Do you have any insight into that?

Mr. Small, in your discussions with other countries, can you give us some insight into how their transitions took place to make it smooth so that none of the work that was being done by the international development agencies got left behind?

[Michael Small]

I'd be happy to answer that. In the conversations that we had in the countries I mentioned, we didn't get into looking back, which is exactly what they did at the immediate moment of transition. We were looking at how they made the integrated departments work. They were also candid about what hadn't worked as well and what they needed to adjust as they went along. A couple of them, by the way, have separate technical agencies—Norway, for instance—and they spent a lot of time explaining the boundary problems that were created by having a technical agency that was apart from the foreign ministry that still did development work. Those are some of the specifics that came out.

On transition planning, I'm beginning to put together officials in both departments who are interested and supportive of this work and who bring expertise and knowledge across the whole range of activities of what the new department would cover. Obviously, we're doing this on behalf of the ministers. Personally, I report to both deputy ministers of Foreign Affairs and the president of CIDA at the moment as the first-person nucleus of a transition team. It's a matter of doing a lot of internal consultations, discussions, and analysis of exactly what the resources are of the organizations and where the best fits are.

The goal is coherence and synergy. You need to build structures that are going to get you there. That's exactly what we're in the planning phase working on right now. This is all planning in advance of the bill being passed and becoming law, and the reality taking place. After that happens, on the assumption that Parliament chooses to put that into law, then there's a whole implementation phase, which is where a great deal of discussion can happen internally and externally on business processes, on how you work in specific fragile countries, on how you coordinate these instruments. It's harvesting good ideas from stakeholders and from staff, which is what my colleague alluded to.

That's something we're already anticipating doing. I have to say my focus right now is getting the planning done for what needs to be in place for a new department to be stood up on the first day after the bill is passed.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Small, are you confident that we have the expertise available, the personnel available, to make this happen and to happen smoothly? Do you see any place where there's a possibility of gaps in our humanitarian assistance, or gaps in our development assistance because of this transition, or do you think it's going to move forward fairly smoothly?

[Michael Small]

I'm convinced it's going to move forward very smoothly. First of all, in terms of machinery of government changes, I've been a public servant my whole career and I've seen a number, including in the Department of Foreign Affairs. There's a lot of expertise on how to go about doing that.

In terms of gaps in programming, I don't see any indication of why that would occur, because what's being amalgamated is all of the Canadian International Development Agency's mandate. It's changing and bringing its minister into a new structure under this act. It's bringing in its programming, and its priorities are clearly spelled out in the bill and in the budget statement, so there really is no ambiguity about the fact that development is now going to be at the core of Canada's international interests, as it says in the budget. We're putting that into an expression in terms of a new institutional and bureaucratic structure to deliver on that mandate.

I don't know if you want to add anything, Nadir?

[Nadir Patel]

If I may, Mr. Chair, I'll just add a couple of comments because I think it's an important question.

We are in, as my colleague pointed out, the planning stages right now. There is an opportunity now, as I stated in my opening remarks—and in fact not only an opportunity but a desire—for consultations to take place. I would just clarify that. I'm not so sure that it's accurate to say that there were no consultations, even up until now. In fact, I can't say what Finance would have done in advance of the actual budget, but I do know that the question asked of us was, when did you know about this? We knew about it a couple of days before. But there is an opportunity to consult stakeholders, employees, bargaining agents. It's not unreasonable for that, in my view, to take place now at this stage. In fact, some of that will need to take place after the new department is created as well. There are some elements that we'll focus on to ensure they're immediately addressed, and then some elements that will take some additional time to align.

We use the term “consultations”, and it could mean different things to different people. But I think there's certainly an opportunity for that to happen right now and there's a desire for that to happen, going forward. I think the legislation should give the parameters to move ahead, and I think it does, but I think that's an important point and we'll continue to build on that as we go forward.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you. That's all the time we have.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Can I just say, Mr. Chair, that the finance committee did cross the country before the budget was put together, and they heard from stakeholders from every area of this country on issues that were important to Canadians. I just put forward that extensive consultations on this budget have taken place.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

Mr. Dechert.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Rigby, did you have a follow-up to that last answer?

[Vincent Rigby]

I do.

Mr. Chair, I was just going to reinforce what Michael said with respect to CIDA programming. The core mandate of CIDA has not changed. It has in fact been enshrined in legislation now. We all have day jobs, and while this is going to be a complex business, our day jobs are to deliver policy and programming, so we're committed to continuing to deliver that programming on a day-to-day basis.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

Thank you, gentlemen.

When Minister Baird appeared before this committee last month, he addressed the merger and he said something interesting. He said that we all have an oar in the water and we all want to row together. Can you tell us what the role of Canada's heads of missions will be and how they will be able to contribute to a more coherent policy with this move?

Mr. Patel, do you want to try your hand at this, and Mr. Small?

[Michael Small]

I guess that comes to me, since I've been a head of mission on two occasions, and the heads of mission are among the people we're consulting.

The role of a head of mission is as always to integrate and coordinate all of the Canadian government's presence abroad and to provide services to Canadians overseas. That is generically what the role is. This change is not dramatic, but it is subtle and it is important. What it means is that, whereas previously....

I will give you a specific example. I was Canada's ambassador to Cuba from 2000 to 2003. We had a small but very valuable and effective aid program, which continues there. I was a big supporter of what it was doing to promote economic modernization in a rather particular context. The difference is that the head of that program kept me informed at all times of the activities, and I would represent Canada's overall interests in that program. Once a development function becomes part of the same ministry, though, your head of mission has a lot more of a role to play upstream, in the planning and discussion process as to what the priorities will be going forward, and furthermore will review people's performance. You don't do that, as a head of mission, for people who come from other departments. You are there to coordinate the implementation, but you're not there to actually evaluate it.

The flip side is equally important, and this is a message that I give in internal discussions. Development, now, under this new ministry, is going to be everybody's business. I repeat that. It's everybody's business, in the same way that trade and commerce are everybody's business. So heads of mission will be judged on their contribution to the development assistance program. This won't just be in places where there are development assistance programs.

I made a point to our ambassadors, in those four countries that we visited, that they were expected—and I have followed up with them—to start doing continuing analysis and engagement with those countries, and this will be done in other donor countries as well, so that we're better informed about what other donors are doing. This is because, even if you're posted in Finland—to pick a country that you used in your example—our head of mission there should now put a little higher on his priority list the analyzing and understanding of how Finnish aid works, in order to inform and target our activities more effectively.

So it's both an internal and an external change in the role, in terms of the priority that it gives for heads of missions.

[Bob Dechert, Conservative, Mississauga—Erindale, ON]

I noticed, when I was reviewing the legislation before us today, some comparisons to the existing Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the way it is managed.

First of all, is that an accurate interpretation? Are there similarities there? Can you explain to this committee the day-to-day relationship or structure between Foreign Affairs and Trade? How does it work, and how do you see it working with the addition of CIDA to the mix?