Government Operations Committee on Oct. 3rd, 2006

[Maria Barrados]

May I make a couple of comments on your introductory comments?

On the basis of timing, I'm happy to come to this committee, and we have been exploring the best way to do this. I have to table this report in Parliament. Last year we tried to brief the committee in camera, but then we never had a meeting on the record. Meetings on the record are extremely important for me because they give messages about what members of Parliament are concerned about in the management of the public service. People watch these things, and it matters a lot. The fact that I had an in camera meeting and not a meeting on the record meant I didn't have a record of these very important messages.

When I discussed this with the chair, we thought we would try it this way. I'm at the disposal of the committee. I am happy to come back, and I'm happy to take a different approach to doing it.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

It's certainly not a criticism of any person here. It's simply a matter that we are elected to represent the Canadian public and hold all of the public service accountable, and I don't know if we can adequately do that if we haven't had time to even look at the material.

[Maria Barrados]

I'd be happy to consider this a briefing and come back to answer any of your questions.

On the phantom positions, I am reluctant to give names. If you put me in camera and tell me to give you the names, I will give you the names. I am here to serve you.

On the national area of selection part of your question, the way the current legislation stands, it gives discretion to the Public Service Commission to allow a geographic limit on a competition. That means you can hold a competition and you can say you will accept applications only from a certain geographic area. Members of Parliament have been very concerned about that. The reason it is there is to try to manage volume. I have gotten the message. This is not something that people, certainly on the Hill, like to have, although for public servants it's a lot easier for them to manage their processes.

What we have done is to incrementally put in place a broadening out of this area of selection by saying, “No, you can't limit it geographically; it must be for all of Canada.” That has been the case for all executive positions: the assistant deputy ministers, directors general, directors, and one or two levels under that. Now we've taken it down for the national capital area. There was a lot of concern about the jobs in Ottawa.

When we say “officer level” we are excluding the clerical and labouring-level jobs. We've started with the officer level in the national capital. Next April we'll be doing it for all across the country. We hope to have all the national area of selections done by December 2007.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Currently it's only the national capital area?

[Maria Barrados]

Currently it's all EXs, all executives, the two levels under executives, and now the officer level in the national capital area. On April 1, 2007, it's going to be all officer level positions across the country.

The problem is volume. I was telling you that we have three-quarters of a million applications. We have to have a mechanism to handle the volume appropriately and fairly, because we don't want to impose a set of rules or new requirements on people and not have them really follow them, or work around them and slow down the hiring process. We have the systems in place to support managers to do this. We're moving to the first round of screening being electronic, so we can reduce the numbers. When we have a smaller number of applicants, obviously that's no longer electronic.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

Could you just briefly describe what the electronic screening would involve?

[Maria Barrados]

It's a computer system.

[Harold Albrecht, Conservative, Kitchener—Conestoga, ON]

I understand that, but what are the other criteria?

[Maria Barrados]

We had to do a fair bit of work, because there are things like Monster.com and these big systems. We couldn't actually use something like that. What we ask managers to do is create a series of questions that tell about the kind of job, the skills, and the interests and aptitudes they're looking for. Then this is put into an electronic questionnaire. People log on and answer the questions. Based on the answers, you're screened in or out.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

We're moving to five-minute questions and answers. We'll go to Mr. Bains.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I have just a few questions. Continuing with my earlier discussion with respect to the Employment Equity Act, specifically when we set targets—a level of accountability with respect to deputy ministers—in terms of being able to hold them accountable for reaching these targets eventually down the road, would you have any recommendations of how we do that, based on your experiences? How do we ultimately hold them accountable for reaching these targets with the aboriginal community, women, and visible minorities? We set these targets and we continue not to hit them, especially in one area we identified. How do we hold deputy ministers or government officials accountable for reaching these targets on a going-forward basis? How do you make concrete accountability, as opposed to criticizing them? Then they say, yes, they'll make commitments. Again, we criticize them, and yes, they'll make commitments, and so on. How do we avoid that pattern on a going-forward basis?

[Maria Barrados]

We've done pretty well on three out of four.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Correct.

[Maria Barrados]

I have to say that overall, in the case of aboriginals, we've met the target of workforce availability—remember, that's what we're saying. It's not any other kind of target but getting them up to workforce availability. In the case of aboriginal people, there was a commitment to have a 50% representation in Indian and Norther Affairs, which came out of one of the human rights commission settlements. In terms of workforce availability for aboriginal people, they're there. In terms of the commitments made for the department, they're not there.

Regarding your question about how do we make this work, I don't have a magic bullet. I think the questions of a committee like this are very good. If you're ever in front of Senator Oliver, he certainly makes you feel that this is an issue of importance. So that's a very important part of this process.

What I've committed to do is look at the plans people have and challenging them. In all the work I do, I raise this issue.

For example, regarding our temporary executive positions, the reason we worry about limiting how you get into those is that it's all right for the people you happen to know, but it doesn't give opportunity for people you don't know. If you look at the numbers, the effect is that you don't give visible minorities a chance. Once they get in, they perform as well as everyone else, but they're just denied that access. This is one I'm pushing on.

I think we have to have a systematic approach. I'll borrow the term from my friend, Sheila Fraser: nagging. We really have to work on the system.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

It's the art of nagging.

[Maria Barrados]

Yes.

I believe the other thing we have to do is have a role at the Public Service Commission to make pools of people available. The response is, “Well, I'm sorry, we just don't have anybody who can do this job.” Well, I have a pool of people who can do this job for you.

I'm getting a good response. So it's not that people don't want to do it; my sense is that they have so many other priorities, they're not putting the extra effort into it.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Based on your insight and experiences, when do you think we'll be able to close the gap? Two or three years? Can you estimate the time?

[Maria Barrados]

I'd have a hard time giving you that, but I'll keep it in mind. If you ask me again in a little while, I'll be able to give you an answer.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

That sounds fair. Like anyone in your position, you have targets and you want to eliminate these gaps. That's why I asked the question.

With respect to audits and your ability to perform them, I'd like some clarification. For 2006-07, on a going-forward basis, how many audits are currently under way and how many do you conduct each year?

[Maria Barrados]

I'm going to ask Mary to give the specific numbers.

I would like to have more audits than I have. Mary can tell you that we're aiming for about three or four. My issue on the audit side is not a lack of funding, because I've managed to reallocate within my organization. But when I put audits in front of you, I want to make sure they meet rigid standards. My standards are the same as those of the Office of the Auditor General, and I have a bit of a curve in training auditors.

Mary, do you want to talk about your plans?

[Mary Clennett]

I'd like to be able to give you a better answer than I can right now. We're currently doing our plan for the next fiscal year. One of our challenges, which we alluded to, is getting qualified auditors. It's the training. There is a shortage of skilled auditors and HR professionals, so resourcing is a challenge for us. We have a couple of audits under way, and I'm confident that with current resources we will be able to put out audits again. I'd like to put out two to three audits in the spring, then three in the fall. Our ultimate goal is to get more—six to ten audits a year.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Then you are about halfway to your goal.

[Mary Clennett]

Yes, we've been doing capacity-building and focusing on it. We also want to produce audit reports as we go along.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Monsieur Nadeau.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Good morning, Ms. Clennett, Ms. Barrados, Ms. Gobeil and Mr. Lemaire.

The matter of the public service is one that affects me directly since my riding is next to Ottawa and, by that very fact, many of my constituents are federal public servants. Having said that, I do have quite a few questions to ask, although I will try to do so in such a way that you have an opportunity to answer them.

First of all, there is the matter of civil servants getting involved in politics. The Public Service Commission has new procedures in that regard. In Ontario, the municipal election process is now underway. I presume that in various parts of the Province of Ontario, many civil servants are taking an interest. In that kind of situation, federal civil servants have to follow one of the procedures you've put in place. There could also be provincial elections in another province.

Do you have the necessary staff to enforce the rules that have now been implemented?

When a civil servant has the Commission's approval, he is required to take leave without pay for the two weeks preceding his nomination. Once the election has been called, that civil servant goes on leave without pay. In a specific case that I'm aware of, a review was carried out but the civil servant only had three days to submit his nomination papers. Fortunately, he had no competitors. But had it been the opposite, things might have been a little more complicated.

My second question has to do with political appointments. I believe you addressed that subject earlier. Here, I am thinking of ministerial staff who all of a sudden end up back in the public service because someone is trying to shield them from scandal -- for example, the sponsorship scandal. These people know nothing, or practically nothing, about the work they are expected to perform wherever they happen to have been parachuted in, and yet they end up being in charge of a group of civil servants who are very familiar with the particular area in which they work.

Are political appointments still a problem? Will Bill C-2 still allow these kind of appointments to go ahead? Is this still a thorn in our side?

What exactly do you audit in terms of non-partisanship? If, in a given riding, a federal civil servant puts a lawn sign out supporting a Conservative candidate, is that enough for him to be deemed partisan? Are ranking, salary level and responsibilities decisive factors? These questions all relate to the first area I'd like you to address.

Now I'd like to turn to another topic, specifically, recruitment. Some of my constituents have been telling me that they occasionally get contract work, but are unable to obtain a full-time job. According to them, the job description is passed on to the individual they're interested in hiring. That person then develops his resume based on what it says in the job description. In cases like that, even though the position is available to everybody or at least everyone in the public service, the situation is far from being fair for everyone.

My other question has to do with employment equity. Within the departments, there has to be, from a statistical standpoint, equitable representation of people with disabilities, visible minorities, First Nations or, in some areas, women. Yet in some cases cutbacks may mean that the number of people in these categories no longer reflects employment equity rules. What is the procedure in such cases? Is competency the most important factor? I'd be interested in hearing your comments on that.

Finally, the Federal Government has long fingers that get into a little bit of everything. It also has a great deal of money. With the fiscal imbalance, we have seen that it seriously interferes in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Under certain agreements -- and we saw this in Quebec as regards occupational training - federal civil servants have ended up becoming provincial civil servants as a result of the transfer of certain responsibilities.

Is this the case in all the provinces? When responsibility for certain issues is transferred to the province, does that mean that a federal civil servant can end up being a provincial civil servant in Ontario or Nova Scotia?