Government Operations Committee on Nov. 23rd, 2017

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

I welcome our witnesses and our guests.

Today, colleagues, we will be discussing supplementary estimates (B) and the departmental performance reports. We have a number of witnesses who will be giving testimony on both.

I think all of our guests know how committees operate. Certainly, this committee is no different. We'll hear your testimony. I understand we will have three presentations of approximately 10 minutes each. We'll then go into questions from all of our committee members.

I want to welcome as well a new committee member, Madame Sansoucy.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you for being here. I think it's your first time at our committee. It's good to have you with us.

Without any further ado, we will start.

I introduce Ms. Kathleen Fox for her opening statement, please.

[Kathleen Fox, Chair, Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board]

Mr. Chair, and honourable members, I want to thank you for inviting the Transportation Safety Board of Canada to appear today. I bring with me two colleagues who offer a wealth of experience. Mr. Jean Laporte is our chief operating officer. He has been with us since our inception in 1990. He possesses a deep understanding of our mandate and the processes we follow.

Luc Casault is our director general of corporate services. He is well placed to provide greater context and information about the financial and corporate details of our work.

For those members of the committee who may be unfamiliar with the Transportation Safety Board, I'd like to start with a very brief overview of who we are and what we do.

Our agency was created in 1990 by the Canadian Transportation Accident Investigation and Safety Board Act. Our mandate and our sole purpose is to advance transportation safety in the air, marine, rail, and pipeline modes of transportation. We do that by conducting independent investigations, identifying safety deficiencies, causes, and contributing factors, making recommendations, and reporting publicly on our investigations and their findings.

We do not attribute blame or civil or criminal liability.

Put simply, when something goes wrong, we investigate not only what happened but why it happened. Then we make public what we've learned so that those best placed to take action—meaning the regulators in the industry—can do so.

The main reason for our presence before this committee today is straightforward. We're asking for additional funds to cover a shortfall in our salary budget for the current fiscal year. Following the implementation of recent collective agreements for public servants, the TSB has had to absorb much of the costs for both current salary increases and retroactive salary payments. While we were diligent in setting aside funds over the last two years to cover those costs, the final agreed-upon salary increases were nonetheless higher than anticipated. The amount we are requesting is $1.8 million. Broken down, that's approximately $1.5 million for salaries and $300,000 for statutory contributions to employee benefit plans.

Second, our departmental results report was recently tabled, and we'd be pleased to take this opportunity to discuss our results with the committee. Last year was a particularly busy one for the Transportation Safety Board. For instance, we published 44 investigation reports and issued a total of 20 recommendations in the marine, rail, and aviation sectors.

We hosted an inaugural transportation safety summit that brought together senior Canadian transportation executives from government and the transportation industry, along with some of their labour organizations.

We completed an in-depth safety study on expanding the use of locomotive voice and video recorders in Canada.

On top of that, we launched a new edition of our safety watchlist, which identifies the key safety issues that need to be addressed to make Canada's transportation system even safer.

Senior management, meanwhile, has undertaken a number of efforts to improve the way we go about our business. For example, we implemented a more structured and robust project management process aimed at improving investigation timeliness, along with enhanced measures for tracking the progress of investigations. We're also placing a greater emphasis on teamwork, and the scoping and assignment of investigation tasks is now done in a manner that better leverages all personnel across the country.

We also continued to increase the amount of information that we proactively publish on our website.

While the TSB is a small organization, which can somewhat limit our flexibility, we have a strong track record when it comes to adapting to change and getting things done, so we thank you for asking us to be here today and we'll be pleased to take your questions in due course.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

I thank you, Madam Fox, for the economy of your words.

We now have Madam Ramcharan. You have 10 minutes please.

[Kami Ramcharan, Assistant Deputy Minister, Corporate Services, Privy Council Office]

Okay, thank you.

Good morning, Chair, and members of the committee. Thank you for inviting the Privy Council Office to review our 2017-18 supplementary estimates (B).

As you know, the mandate of the Privy Council Office is to provide professional, non-partisan advice and support to the Prime Minister and ministers within his portfolio, and to support the effective operation of cabinet.

As a central agency, PCO exerts a leadership role across government departments and agencies to ensure the coherence and coordination of policy development and delivery.

We sought $144.9 million via the main estimates 2017-18, which represents an increase of $24.2 million from the amount sought in our 2016-17 main estimates, which was $120.7 million. This increase was mainly due to additional funding to enhance our capacity to support the Prime Minister and the government in the delivery of their agenda as announced in budget 2016. Much of this increased funding was used as follows:

We have provided advice to the Prime Minister, as Minister of Youth, on engaging young Canadians in consultations on government initiatives, on establishing the Prime Minister's Youth Council, and we have supported two meetings between the Prime Minister and council members in 2016-17.

We have managed the open, transparent, and merit-based selection process for Government of Canada appointments which resulted in the processing of almost 12,000 applications and 123 appointments in 2016-17.

A website was developed and implemented to allow Canadians to apply directly for vacant Senate positions. More than 2,700 applications were received, which resulted in 20 appointments.

We have successfully played a policy challenge function to departments and provided high quality logistical support to ensure the efficiency and effectiveness of the cabinet committees' system; we supported the work of 166 cabinet and cabinet committee meetings, and almost 597 cabinet documents were issued.

The clerk was supported in his efforts to advance key renewal issues like mental health, diversity and inclusion, and discussion groups were created to seek feedback.

A number of information management and information technology projects, such as the modernization of PCO's internal email, upgrading to new mobile device services, and improvements to security and IT infrastructure were implemented.

We have enhanced engagement with provinces and territories, as well as municipalities and indigenous groups, serving the Prime Minister as Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs.

We have increased our policy capacity to support the democratic institutions reform agenda and we have led the national dialogue on the future of Canada's democracy.

In addition to the $144.9 million received via estimates 2017-18, PCO also sought $34.4 million in supplementary estimates (A) for the operations of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, and PCO was given access to the 2016-17 carry-forward of $5.3 million to bring our overall total authorities to $184.6 million.

Today we are seeking an additional $34.3 million in 2017-18 supplementary estimates (B), bringing PCO's total 2017-18 authorities to $218.9 million. These additional resources will be used to pursue the information management and information technology project we started in 2016-17, which consists of replacement and upgrade of current IT infrastructure, the modernization of PCO systems, the introduction of new information sharing, business intelligence and reporting solutions, and transitioning to a top-secret network.

It will also lead the establishment of the national security and intelligence committee of parliamentarians, NSICOP, and its secretariat. PCO will receive funds to cover costs for NSI accommodation, security, information technology and salary costs until NSICOP receives its own appropriation in December 2017.

We will fund a study to assess the current state of innovation in the public sector and propose areas for action to reinforce capacity to innovate and thereby deliver better outcomes for citizens and the government.

This comprises the major needs and initiatives to be funded through PCO's proposed supplementary estimates (B).

Mr. Chair, and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to provide you with this context. I'd be pleased to answer any of your questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Monsieur Borbey.

[Patrick Borbey, President, Public Service Commission]

Good morning, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. I am pleased to be here today along with Philip Morton, our vice-president of corporate affairs, to discuss the Public Service Commission of Canada's supplementary estimates (B) and our 2016-17 Departmental Results Report.

The Public Service Commission promotes and safeguards merit-based appointments, and in collaboration with other stakeholders protects the non-partisan nature of the public service. The PSC reports directly to Parliament on its mandate. The Minister of Public Services and Procurement, as designated minister, tables our annual report and other reports in Parliament on our behalf.

Our supplementary estimates (B) are fairly straightforward. They provide for the transfer of $252,000 from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. The CFIA is a separate agency named in Schedule V of the Financial Administration Act, which uses the Public Service Resourcing System—the system behind the government's primary job portal.

As such, the agency is not subject to permanent transfers like other organizations. Its financial contributions to support the PSRS have traditionally been provided via the supplementary estimates process. We are working to have this amount included in annual reference levels for future years.

With regards to the Departmental Results Report, it is an exciting time to be leading the Public Service Commission. Our 2016-17 report outlines many of the PSC's accomplishments. I will not go into them in great detail, but I want to confirm that we recognize that no two departments are alike and have provided organizations with the room to staff positions in response to their unique needs.

We are placing a greater emphasis on designing our programs and services based on the needs of end-users—hiring managers and job candidates. We are working with our partners to explore new and truly innovative ways to attract, recruit, and assess qualified candidates from coast to coast to coast.

One case I will bring to your attention is the redesign of our student application process carried out last year. It saw the length of time to complete an application for employment reduced from an average of 60 minutes to six minutes and from 10 pages of content to four pages. It is the type of innovation that I want to see incorporated into all other aspects of our recruitment and assessment work at the Public Service Commission.

I have been encouraging PSC staff to be bold, take intelligent risks, and not be afraid of failure. I firmly believe that these elements are key to innovation and allow us to try new things and challenge the status quo.

As we approach the 110th anniversary of the creation of the PSC, I want to assure Parliament and Canadians that the changes we make will not compromise our role in safeguarding Canada's merit-based and non-partisan public service, which is so well regarded across the world.

We would be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have.

Meegwetch. Qujannamiik.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Colleagues, before we get into questions, I remind you that I'm going to try to save about 15 minutes at the end of this meeting to go into committee business for some brief items we have to discuss. That will be about an hour and a half from now.

Mr. Whalen, you're up for seven minutes.

[Nick Whalen, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, all, for coming today. We greatly appreciate the work the independent civil service does, and we look forward to this opportunity today to grill you guys a little bit. It's with the utmost respect. We just want to make sure that public funds are spent well. As Mr. McCauley likes to point out, this is probably our most important duty here on the Hill.

I'm going to focus primarily on you, Ms. Ramcharan, with respect to the work that's being done with the youth council. I have a youth council at my office. We spend a modest amount of money to get children and young adults together to help inform our views on policies. We find it very productive.

Are there any particular deliverables that are meant to come out of these meetings from the PMO and your support of the PMO? Are there any public reports that are prepared as a result of it? Are the results of the advice made public to people? How do Canadians know that this money is being spent wisely?

[Kami Ramcharan]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the question.

In terms of how we've been supporting the Prime Minister, the Prime Minister, as you know, signalled his commitment to Canada's young people by assuming the role of Minister of Youth. We have within PCO a youth secretariat that supports the Prime Minister in his capacity by providing the strategic leadership, the policy advice, and the coordination on youth commitments. As well as supporting him in terms of his role on the youth council, we connect youth with engagement opportunities in other key policy areas, and we provide strategic advice on a youth service initiative.

They've had a number of meetings over the past year in Calgary, Montreal, and St. John's, and various conference calls with leaders and government officials to discuss their perspectives on issues that matter most to young people, such as youth employment, mental health, poverty reduction, reconciliation, the environment, climate change, clean growth, and youth service. They've also had an opportunity to create opportunities for youth across Canada who have expressed an interest in engaging with the Government of Canada, to do different kinds of engagement opportunities on a wide range of issues.

[Nick Whalen, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

That's very interesting. I think we have the sense that the work is well worthwhile.

In terms of appointments, this is a new appointment process before this committee. We've heard of a number of instances where change management hasn't gone particularly well within the civil service.

What type of metric is the department using to make sure the appointment process is functional and that decisions are made increasingly better and increasingly more efficiently? Are there timelines by which you gauge the success of the appointment process? Perhaps you could let us know about measures of success on the appointments file.

[Kami Ramcharan]

The appointments file has been very successful over the past year. We have done a number of different transactions. Almost 400 appointments were made after following an open and transparent merit-based selection process; approximately 290 short-term transitional appointments to ensure the continuity of service to Canadians; and approximately 740 appointments made through other selection processes. We have done a lot of work over the past year.

As you're aware, the government is really committed to having more diverse appointments. To that, we have been able to make sure that of all those appointments, nearly 60% were women; over 10% were visible minorities; 10% were indigenous Canadians; and persons with disabilities were well represented. In addition, based on that total representation, we have seen that the GIC appointments have increased by 5%, so that now, overall, 40% are women. There have been a number of successes in that area, and they continue that over this current year.

[Nick Whalen, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

I guess that's success demonstrated.

An interesting article appeared this week in the national media. It may have been CTV News or the CBC; I'm not sure. It was about the SS7 attacks on Canadian telecommunications. In particular, Monsieur Dubé of the New Democratic Party was a test case for his use of cellphone technology. The ease with which hackers can track the locations and the communications, and even record the locations and calls that people are making using cellphone technology in Canada very simply was quite concerning.

With respect to the security in IT infrastructure that's been implemented for the PMO and the PCO, do we have a higher degree of confidence that those devices are protected against SS7 attacks? Is there a higher degree of certainty or are you relying on the same network security that all Canadians are using, which has been shown to be completely deficient in the news reports this week?

[Kami Ramcharan]

It might be a question more appropriate for my colleagues at Shared Services Canada, but maybe I can talk to you about what we're doing at PCO, from a cybersecurity perspective, in terms of understanding the current environment we're in and the steps we're taking.

Specifically to your question with regard to cellphones, we all recognize that when using cellphones, it is open for people to listen to conversations, to access them. What we've done with some of the resources we received in our first Treasury Board submission for IM and IT was really take a look at our mobile travel devices, for instance, when our senior officials are travelling to other countries. We have looked at providing a mobile travel device that would allow them to continue to maintain their own email address but that would really scale down the access they have in terms of going forward. If their phone is hacked, per se, the hackers have the opportunity to really get very limited information and not any secure information. We were able to do that with the initial funds that we had from—

[Nick Whalen, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

I'm sure there are going to be more questions about this the week following this news report.

My final question is really in respect of your proposed study on the current state of innovation. Some new appropriation money is going there. It seems that adoption, creation, and implementation of technology across government is something that all parts of government are studying, and so I really have two questions.

Is this study that's being proposed under PCO being coordinated with other departments that are also engaged in similar studies? We've heard from TSB that they're looking at agile approaches to change management. Also, there's a whole life-cycle understanding of innovation. There's the creation. First, there's the primary research that comes up with new ideas. There's development of products from that new research. There's prototyping of those new products to make sure they work. Then there's the adoption of those technologies within a particular enterprise. Are you focusing on only step four, or are you looking at innovation in all those four areas of the innovation life cycle?

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

We're going to have to get you to refrain from answering, since we are over time. However, if subsequent questions don't come back to the same material, we would invite you to provide written responses to the chair following your presentation here.

We'll now go to Mr. McCauley for seven minutes, please.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

If you can answer Mr. Whalen's question in about 30 seconds, you can go ahead.

[Kami Ramcharan]

Within PCO, we have an innovation hub, an impact and innovation hub. They have the role, right across Canada, to think about different processes, behavioural aspects, of looking at how we do innovation. This study was really to help us get a bit more insight into the leading-edge study that's going on and what we could do further. It really supports a deputy minister task team on innovation. That really does cover the whole gambit across government.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Thank you.

Ms. Fox, most of your estimates request is just for salary increases. Is that correct?

[Kathleen Fox]

That's correct.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

My understanding, and correct me if I'm wrong, is that the TSB, through the act, allows you to do investigations involving Canadian airlines operating outside of Canada.

[Kathleen Fox]

That is correct. To clarify, if it's in another country, for example in the U.S. or a country that has.... They would conduct the investigation. We would provide an accredited representative to them.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

That was another part of my question, but thank you.

Regarding the July Air Canada incident where the plane almost landed on several other planes, a runway incident, there's a gentleman named Jim Hall who is the former chairman of the American NTSB, their transportation safety board. He said it could have been the most significant near miss we've had in a decade and probably came close to the greatest aviation disaster in history. We could have had over 1,000 passengers at risk. Are we assisting in that investigation? The reason I ask that is I noticed on the web page that runway incursions are highlighted as a continuing risk and have been for several years. It's highlighted in the 2016 report. Are we helping with that investigation?

[Kathleen Fox]

With respect to the occurrence in the United States, it is the National Transportation Safety Board that will conduct the investigation but, yes, we are participating. Under the International Civil Aviation Organization, countries can provide an accredited representative, and so we have an accredited representative on that investigation.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

The reason I'm asking this is it sounds like all the money you're looking for is just for back pay. Do you have enough resources to assist? I'm looking at the web page here, and there are 52 recommendations directed at Transport Canada from the TSB watch-list that have been active for 10 years and sometimes 20 years that haven't been addressed.

I'm worried if you have enough resources to follow up on these items and, if you have a response, maybe why Transport Canada is not following up on these very serious issues.