Government Operations Committee on Feb. 5th, 2009

[Hélène Laurendeau]

I'm unable to talk to you in a general way about the funding allocated to hire agency staff. However, agency personnel are usually hired directly by the departments to meet ad hoc needs.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

That's not what the news stories seemed to be saying or what we read in the newspapers. However, I accept your answer, even though I find it quite peculiar. Your role, as you said earlier, is to ensure a certain amount of modernization of the public service. I therefore wonder why so much money is being spent on the services of outside agencies. Perhaps you weren't prepared to answer that question.

Now I'm going to talk about reclassification activities. The employees of the Canada Revenue Agency came and told us during the last session that their classification was being disputed. Do you remember that?

[Hélène Laurendeau]

In all honesty, no. I must say, however, that the Canada Revenue Agency is a separate employer, outside the fold of the Treasury Board Secretariat's employer function.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

All right.

[Hélène Laurendeau]

Even if I remembered the question, I wouldn't be able to answer.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Then you're not the one we should ask .

[Hélène Laurendeau]

You should contact the agency directly.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

I have one final question. Do you have a human resources plan for the next 10 years?

[Hélène Laurendeau]

Every department has an obligation to engage in human resources management planning when it establishes its business plan. Every department is able to answer those questions. As to whether we have an overall plan, I would say that we have strategic objectives, but that we don't have an integrated document outlining human resources planning for the government as a whole, since that authority is delegated to the departments, based on their needs and the programs they deliver.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

However, your agency must ensure that all the departments have a plan. You must give them the means to hire and to help them find staff.

[Hélène Laurendeau]

Under its policy, the Human Resources Management Agency of the Public Service must support the departments so that they can effectively do good planning and recruit staff. Yes, absolutely.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Perhaps we'll study the public service's staff requirements at another time. Could we then ask you for a more or less long-term plan that would help determine how many employees will be leaving the public service and how many will be rehired in the various departments?

Where do you stand in your personnel search? Can we ask you that?

[Hélène Laurendeau]

In fact, that question should be put to the Human Resources Management Agency of the Public Service. It's reponsible for demographic planning.

[Diane Bourgeois, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

My it's complicated!

That's fine, thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Derek Lee]

Merci.

Mr. Warkentin, for a full opening round.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all of you for coming in this afternoon. We appreciate your joining us today.

There are a number of things. Obviously, estimates can be somewhat dry, but once you get into something, there may be something of interest buried down deep. So we're going to drill in a little bit, if that's all right.

I've been spending a fair bit of time, as those members who have been longstanding on this committee will know, on concerns I have with regard to the public service and the renewal actions that have been initiated by this government and previous governments. I'm not yet convinced that although we're spending significant amounts of money we're necessarily getting the total result we're hoping for. I think there continue to be some places where we could maybe manage this better.

I do see that there has been a significant expenditure of $17 million, and Mr. Smith, you did get into it to an extent, but I wonder if I could just drill down into those numbers a little bit. Maybe it's appropriate for our committee to understand a little bit more clearly exactly what those moneys are being utilized for.

[Alister Smith]

Thank you. I will just refer to the information available to me. It may well be the case that the agency will have to come back with more detail, because I don't claim to be an expert on this.

I understand that of the $17.1 million there is a significant amount of funding for public service renewal. The agency does a range of things to support the government's efforts to renew the public service, including supporting the Prime Minister's advisory committee and deputy ministers' committees on public service renewal, which have led the way to significant renewal of the public service. They also support the public service employee survey. They support HR business processes. They support commitments to third parties in the public service, legal services and corporate services involved in public service renewal. So they have a significant reach in trying to advance public service renewal, and that's a large part of the funding request.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

I suspect I'm getting into areas in which you are probably not best positioned to answer, and maybe we will have to have the renewal action group come in here.

We in this committee identified that there was a turnover in many departments of up to 75% of personnel. My suspicion is that there are significant amounts of money spent on doing that, but also there's a huge amount of opportunity that is lost as a result of that turnover.

Clearly, we're spending more. I haven't yet seen that any of these are directed at seeing fewer people moving around. There are moneys that are targeted at many of the initiatives, and maybe we just need to drill down with Madame Barrados and her team to find out exactly what initiatives they're spending this money on. She may be the best prepared to answer those questions.

In terms of looking through the estimates, I notice there is this amount that's being allocated for funding to support pay equity litigation. I know we talked about the fact that there's one that's coming to a close here. It's $6.5 million, almost $6.6 million, that was spent in this past year. Could you give me an indication as to whether most of that money was spent on that particular case or whether it's just spread across, or what we're looking at there?

[Kelly Gillis, Assistant Secretary, Corporate Services Branch, Treasury Board Secretariat]

That money was received in supplementary estimates (B) related to the case that Madame Laurendeau was speaking about before and looking at working with the Department of Justice and reaching a potential settlement for that particular case.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

These dollars don't actually go to fund any type of settlement; it's simply for legal—

[Kelly Gillis]

No.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

Is this for legal fees on both sides, or just the government side?

[Hélène Laurendeau]

It was the forecast expenditure to actually prepare the case from a research standpoint and from a legal counsel standpoint, and also for internal research for things like search for documents and preparation for complaints and litigation.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

So just to better understand this, this money is being allocated for out-of-house resources? This isn't being allocated for people who are currently within the civil service?

[Kelly Gillis]

There was a project team established to be able to manage that particular project, as well as, through the Department of Justice, outside legal counsel to support the activities.