Government Operations Committee on Nov. 19th, 2007

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

You've done a fair bit of work, it seems, on the issue of casual employees and how they're being drawn into the public service. Have you had a chance to look at the issue of turnover in various departments? The question I would raise is that I know there are certain departments where there's bidding for jobs between an urban centre and say a large rural region like Timmins--James Bay, where we have a very low turnover of federal employees. The argument we always put forward is that when you invest in a federal employee in one of the regions you have someone who is committed there for life. Yet some of the anecdotal evidence we're hearing is that we're putting a fair amount of cost into training workers in some of the large urban centres. You're seeing higher levels of turnovers because there are a lot more opportunities: once they're trained, they can move on.

Have you looked at the issue of turnover and what effect that has on the efficiency of various departments?

[Maria Barrados]

I do raise a concern about the area of turnover. I have to say that it's turnover within the public service. Overall, we see an increase in departures from the public service more at the senior levels and the executive levels than at the lower levels, but nothing that is unusually alarming to any other workforce. It's just that we're not used to it in the public service, so it's something one has to pay attention to.

I do raise the issue of the overall level of movement I'm seeing within the public service. That is a concern. We took a rather rough estimate because we use the Hay system. We looked at the job that people had at the beginning of the year and the job they held at the end of the year and we asked if there was a change. It could be a lateral movement, it could be the same level, it could be up or it could be down. We've seen a steady increase in this movement.

This year, 2006-07, we saw it at 40%. The year before it was at 35%, and the year before that it was at 30%. So we've seen a steady increase. We've seen some of the occupational groups much higher. The human resources group, personnel group, is 76%. The executives are sitting there at 58%. For us, this is a lot of movement. As a manager of an organization myself, I really feel this, because you always worry about training your staff and making sure you have the complement of people to be there to do the work. When you have a lot of rotation it builds in inefficiencies for you.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Thank you.

Mr. Kramp.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

I'd like to build on that same topic. It comes around, actually, to one small point that is part of this problem of reshuffling--the snowball effect and the lack of institutional memory and so on. The chair can recall when we had the problem that people couldn't get paycheques and categorization wasn't accommodated in a reasonable period of time. And when I hear the numbers you're talking about now....

I also refer to an article in the Ottawa Citizen. You were quoted, Madame Barrados, along with David Zussman and Ms. Duxbury, I believe.

We're talking about 40% of the entire workforce changing categorization in a year. In particular, some of the actual categories, such as HR, which of course was responsible for administering a lot of this, is changing, with 76% of them moving to new jobs. We wonder why we can't handle it. It's almost astounding. I couldn't imagine it. I worked in the private sector for years. If I'd had a 20% changeover in staff, I'd be going ballistic. Here we have a 40%, 50%, 60%, and in some cases over 70% change of staff.

How can we continue to operate like that? It's been categorized as a swamped system, a broken human resources system. I think we have to be reasonable here. Are we placing unbelievable expectations on, for example, our pay and benefits people because it's just too much of a workload?

You are quoted in here, and I'll refer to it, but there are enough questions raised on this issue to warrant further work. I think this is an area that.... Whenever there's this massive turnover, we're losing efficiencies, we're losing effectiveness, we're losing key people, as we've said, and we're losing everything from institutional memory. Somehow we have to find a way to reverse that.

We cannot increase by 5% a year. We have to be decreasing by 10% a year. So we need, as Mr. Angus said, more full-time people. We need long-term employees here. That's the great benefit to a corporation. In this case it's the corporation of the people of Canada.

I'd like to know what initiatives and/or investigations you possibly have in place to see if we can start to reverse this slide to ineffectiveness and inefficiency.

[Maria Barrados]

The only good news is that this is within the public service. The other part of it is that we are not growing the public service as a result. We've seen only a very small growth in the public service, so that's an important part of this picture.

I am concerned about this. With the division of responsibilities between the employer and the Public Service Commission, this is not entirely our problem. Part of it is with us, but not all of it. We have been talking to the public service union, or its management agency, and we are undertaking joint work to look at the problem.

I've also initiated a piece of work to identify the areas in the policies where you can see there's direction and guidance. Of course, the simple thing in this is that if every manager decided not to do it, it would stop, but it's not that simple.

We don't want to create a more rule-bound system. I'm not looking for more rules. That's the last place we go. We try everything before we go to more rules. But we definitely have to get a better understanding and move on this.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

I'd like to see a specific plan of action at some particular point. Obviously, it's going to take more evaluation, but it would be nice to see if we had some form of operational plan to try to reverse this trend.

[Maria Barrados]

Mary Clennett advises me that we should be able to write back to the committee in February or March with more specific plans on what we're going to do. We have to work with the others in government. We can't do this on our own.

[Daryl Kramp, Conservative, Prince Edward—Hastings, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Are there any further questions?

We'll go to Monsieur Vincent.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you.

I'd like to get back to the case of the two people who could not be identified.

You said a little earlier that these investigations were conducted between 1990 and 2006. Are these recent cases or have they been the subject of an investigation for a few years?

[Maria Barrados]

Those are two recent cases. These two individuals put questions about priority entitlement to the Public Service Commission. At the same time, they found other ways to obtain the positions. This is recent.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

In light of the answers that were given to questions asked earlier, it's my understanding that a deputy minister, minister or a ministerial assistant can ask a specific person, that they selected themselves, to join the minister's office. Is that how things unfold in reality?

[Maria Barrados]

In these two cases, people from the minister's office had conversations with the public servants, and the result of their actions was the establishment of positions for them, unique and inappropriate positions. That was the only [Editor's Note: Inaudible] that we obtained. The conclusion was that this was not right, and that it was not a proper use of the staffing system. We revoked those positions. We obtained enough information to conclude that this was inappropriate and that these positions had to be abolished.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Was that when you decided to ask Treasury Board to establish a new policy to prevent the reoccurrence of such a situation?

[Maria Barrados]

It was following my report last year that I had conversations with Treasury Board. Treasury Board agrees with this and accepts the principle, but there is no new policy. It's the same response for the auditor's report: Treasury Board accepts the principle, has promised to develop the policy, but what is unclear is when it will do so. That's what concerns me.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

I imagine that they will have told you what we've already heard, namely that it may do something soon, but that nothing has been decided yet.

[Maria Barrados]

The exact terms are in the report. It's positive insofar as it will do something. It's made a commitment under the principle of neutrality in the public service and the need for that. The Treasury Board Secretariat is reviewing all of its policies within the context of a policy renewal initiative. It must take this audit and its ensuing recommendations into account in its review of the Treasury Board policy on leave without pay.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

According to my interpretation, that doesn't means anything. They're going to think about it, but they're not sure. They're going to study it, but they like the practices that they can use today. They wouldn't want to change them. In order to make themselves feel better, they will study it; they won't go any further than that.

You said that you discussed this with Treasury Board a year ago now and that you told them that they needed to amend their policies because things can't work this way. In that year, you haven't received anything in your office that could suggest any sort of change? You haven't received anything yet?

[Maria Barrados]

I expressed the same concerns during discussions on the Accountability Act. They made a commitment to establish a policy. I got the same sort of response. I published that in the annual report last year. They made a commitment to do something, but I can't tell you when it will be done.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

It could still do these things and ask a few public servants to establish phantom positions somewhere and recruit people to fill them, as we've read. Right now, if I understand correctly, departments could still do this. Treasury Board has not intervened. Therefore this practice could continue. If you're not made aware—

[Maria Barrados]

For us, monitoring the system is just as important. We at the Public Service Commission intend to monitor it. If there are other cases, I'm sure that we'll be able to detect them. I think that the ideal thing would be to clarify how it should be done. It isn't a negative thing for a public servant to work in the office of the minister. It can be a good experience. But the way to do so, the way of going from one to the other should be clear.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

According to competence, I imagine?

[Maria Barrados]

According to competence, but there is also the procedure to be followed.

[Robert Vincent, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Yes, because people can be mobile but also partisan. Earlier we talked about communications, but people could be chosen for their allegiance, for services rendered during an election campaign or whatever. When you're elected, you can say that you need these people, and have them come in without taking into account established procedure. Is it normal to proceed this way? Is it normal for a deputy minister or a minister to go hand-pick anyone in the public service, even if the people don't have the required skills to fill the position they want to establish?