Government Operations Committee on June 18th, 2009

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

There is no.... I'm probably done.

[The Chair, Liberal, Derek Lee]

Thank you. I'm sorry to interrupt.

Ms. Barrados is now having to deal with this million-dollar concept. I just wanted to say that amortization is a great friend of big spenders and big borrowers. We have to amortize this over 70,000 persons per year, times a multiple of years. It probably comes out to a buck a head if you do it. So I don't think we should be too distracted by that.

I did want to say to members that we're going to go into five-minute rounds. We have a number of issues that have come before us here, and I get the sense that we're kind of nibbling around at the edges. Ms. Barrados and her team bring us these issues in reality, but they tend to discuss them in concept. They avoid mentioning names and persons and individual ministries, because that's how they should do that responsibly. That doesn't mean that members here can't ask the hard questions and get the accountability.

We're the one place in the world that has the authority to get the information and drill down. We'll do it responsibly and get this information on the record. I'm not saying anybody's pussyfooting around here, and I'm not saying the Public Service Commission is, but if we're going to drill down and get some response to this stuff, then I think we want to hit a few nails on the head. I'll get some questions of my own, perhaps.

[Chris Warkentin, Conservative, Peace River, AB]

Maybe Mr. Chair will make a round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Derek Lee]

Yes, I should take a round later.

Let's boogie here. We have Ms. Foote, for five minutes.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

At the risk of pussyfooting around, I'm going to say that it's nice to have you here this morning.

Back to the use of private firms, my question is, how extensive is the use of private firms for hiring temporary positions? Can you tell me which departments are doing that predominantly? Is there any consultation at all with the PSC in terms of having a discussion about the need to hire on a temporary basis?

[Maria Barrados]

If you look at the public accounts, there's about $300 million used for these temporary firms. The largest use is in the national capital area. About 90% of it is in the national capital area. It's not used very much in the regions. About 60% of that is for clerical support staff, which is what you would expect. Forty per cent of it is used for other levels. There are policies around it, so Public Works and Government Services has standing offers that deal with the use of these firms. Some of the material I've been seeing is that they're actually putting a transfer price on some of these things, so if you employ somebody from a private firm into the public service, there's a fee that has to be paid.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Is this done across the board? Are all departments doing this?

[Maria Barrados]

It is available to all departments.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Who seems to be utilizing it more? Are there some departments doing it more than others?

[Maria Barrados]

There are. I did actually have a list in my briefing package. I looked at it last night, and I can't remember it, but I'll send it to the committee.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Yes. We'd like to have that, please. That would be great.

I understand that this is the way it works, but I could be wrong. Once you're a casual employee and you're in the system, do casual employees have the first opportunity for the permanent positions advertised by the government, by departments, or through PSC before they are advertised externally?

[Maria Barrados]

No. If you are in a term position, you have access to the internal competitions. As casual employees, you do not. In the Government of Canada, under the new legislation, you are allowed to hire in one of two ways. You're allowed to advertise or to go unadvertised. If you go unadvertised, there is absolutely no competition. You know the person, they meet your needs, and you can bring them in unadvertised. We at the PSC--

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Can you give me an example in terms of a position that could go unadvertised?

[Maria Barrados]

Any position can go unadvertised. The commission is objecting to broad use of that unadvertised way and is insisting that there be a policy and a rigorous set of requirements.

Let's say there is an area of shortage, for example, and you have tried to look very hard. You're looking for a particular analyst in a specialty area--it could be biology or it could be medicine--you've tried to find someone, and you can't. Let's say you have somebody who worked for you as a casual and you think they're a good person who can do the job. That would probably be justified. If you have--

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Would they have to justify that with the PSC?

[Maria Barrados]

They have to justify it in their own files, and it's the kind of thing we make a point of checking when we do our audits. It's an area where consistently we are having a lot of trouble. One of my folks here has the actual numbers that I can leave with the committee in terms of the large users of temporary workers.

In the departments that are over $10 million, Defence is the highest, with Environment, Foreign Affairs, Health, the Public Health Agency, HRSD, Natural Resources, Public Works and Government Services, and Transport all over $10 million. I'll leave the list with the committee.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

How often would you audit these departments in terms of what they're doing with respect to temporary and casual employment?

[Maria Barrados]

Our objective is to try to audit every department once every five to seven years. In addition to that, we're watching them more closely than that, so we require a report from departments every year in which we expect reporting on this. We follow up in any of those departments where we think things are looking high or beyond an average range.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Under the employment equity hiring, you've identified an issue with respect to self-identification. You said, “First, we looked at how EE data is gathered through self-identification, and compared approaches and practices across several departments”. Can you elaborate on that for me in terms of the issue with self-identification?

[Maria Barrados]

The issue we had--and we had a discussion on this at the committee--was that we had two numbers about the rate of visible minority hires coming into the public service. One number was 8.9%, which I thought was really a problem, and the other number was 17%, which is much, much better and gives a much better indication of what we were trying to do.

The reason we had these two numbers for the same time period is that they were collected differently. Our preoccupation was whether that was a function of the collection. To try to understand this, we asked what was going on there. Seventeen per cent is collected as part of our automated application system, which is a computerized system. People are forced to answer every screen. The other number, the self-identification number, is a number that is collected when somebody is hired, given a form, and asked to fill it in and send it back.

That whole process--that self-identification process in the departments we looked at and how that was managed--is really not managed very consistently or very well, so we know for sure that we have a problem with the collection of the data. That is not a very reliable number until we do a better job of collecting the information.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Is there--

[The Chair, Liberal, Derek Lee]

That's five minutes, regrettably. You're doing a great job. You're doing a fabulous job.

We have to go to Mr. Roy for five minutes.

[Jean-Yves Roy, Bloc, Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to go back to what my colleague was discussing with you. You gave some examples of departments. I have a hard time understanding how the Department of Defence can hire temporary employees. How does it justify that to you? Where in its operations can DND hire temporary employees?

[Maria Barrados]

I have figures, but I do not have the answer to your question. In the Department of Defence, there are civilian employees as well as military ones. There can be a lot of administrative work to do, and they need clerks and administrators to handle things.

[Jean-Yves Roy, Bloc, Haute-Gaspésie—La Mitis—Matane—Matapédia, QC]

Are the departments you listed not operating in this way because of the budgetary constraints imposed by various governments through the years? Hiring temporary employees provides a lot of flexibility. If you have to deal with a 5% cut in your budget every year, for example, you just have to lay off your temporary employees. But if your staff is made up 90%, 92% or 95% of permanent employees, it will be much harder to deal with budgetary constraints.

Are departments working this way because of the budgetary constraints imposed by successive governments?