Government Operations Committee on April 19th, 2018

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

The reason I ask is this. I think it's your third time with us, Mr. Borbey. Each time I've noted that the previous government and the current government both have done a very, very good job. It's a success story of hiring in the public service. I actually went to the Library of Canada probably six months ago. We show that their employment equity designated groups—women, aboriginal people, people with disabilities, members of visible minority groups—are all overrepresented compared with workforce availability. Again, it's a success story of the previous government and the current government.

The library says, you know, here's the proof, so I'm curious to know what led us to say, well, maybe it's not—even though, again, the previous government and the current government have done a very good job in this matter.

[Patrick Borbey]

Yes. Again, I think we have to go beyond some of those statistics and take a look at where there are some gaps and some differences. For example, I'm concerned when I look at our recruitment campaigns that we're getting fewer indigenous people applying to our programs and fewer persons with disability. We need to understand whether there are some barriers, perceived or real barriers, preventing us from accessing the best talent pools in the country.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Even with applications dropping, your departments are doing a very good job of hiring, because they are increasing in these items you mentioned. Are you able to provide us with some of the information that shows there's a reduction in the applications?

[Patrick Borbey]

Yes.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

The next part is that, again, I want to state, as I have stated to you before, that the current government and the previous government have done an excellent job. It's a success story, and it should be heard, as we only hear the bad stuff. It has been a success story in the hiring. But I do note that, just on an off chance just a couple of months ago, I filed an Order Paper about the cost of the project, and it was almost $200,000.

That's what I'm getting at. Why would we spend $200,000 of taxpayers' money when the proof is clear that this has been a success story and current and previous governments have done a great job and it's improving and on the right track? I'm just curious; did we spend the $200,000 for a real purpose without doing the research, or was it a real need? Has someone brought forth some real shortfalls that somehow aren't reflected in the statistics, or is this going on in the government and it has to be corrected?

[Patrick Borbey]

Again, this is one initiative among a number that we have undertaken—I listed them earlier—to ensure that our recruitment system is bias-free. I have to be able to give that assurance to Parliament that our systems are bias-free. The way we can do that is through experimentation and testing to make sure there are no biases.

To me, this is one initiative in the context of that overall effort. As I said, we're going to continue to do some work in this area using audit methodology, because this did not prove or disprove whether there are barriers or discrimination within our hiring practices in the public service.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I'm thinking that results and success would prove that they're doing the right job, and maybe we should focus on the different parts of encouraging the applications.

When you say you're going to be doing some more audits, would that lead federally to another report, similar to the current one?

[Patrick Borbey]

This will be an audit that we will conduct at the Public Service Commission, so it's not the same as a research study. The audit will take a look at samples of staffing actions across the public service.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

When will that be published?

[Patrick Borbey]

We're designing the methodology right now; this process will probably take some time.

It will probably be at some point next year, Stan?

[Stan Lee]

Yes.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Okay. So it won't be that long from now; within 12 months?

[Stan Lee]

It will be a little more than 12 months, we estimate.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Okay.

When you were doing the pilot project, some applicants were culled out, as you mentioned. Were they contacted, the ones who were disapproved because...or didn't make it through the process of the pilot project? Will they be contacted and invited to reapply?

[Stan Lee]

No one was disadvantaged in the pilot project—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I didn't say disadvantaged, but you did mention that there were...or it did not prove there was any discrimination against some, but you said there was a lower rate for some. Were those from the lower rate approached and offered to—

[Stan Lee]

Yes. We took precautions to ensure that we would have a fair approach in this process. One of the things we did, where there was disagreement or somebody was being screened out, was ask hiring managers to sit down and look at the application again together and determine if the person—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

But if someone was screened out, would they—

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Yasmin Ratansi]

Thank you. Your time is up.

Mr. Blaikie, you have seven minutes.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

The thing that stood out to me in your report was that, first of all, there was no net benefit or disadvantage to using the anonymized screening method, and then there were reduced screen-in rates for all other candidates. Can you help me understand how it is that the screen-in rate for other candidates would be affected simply by having an anonymous application?

[Stan Lee]

We don't really have an answer for that. We have to admit that it's a very intriguing result. We are discussing with some academics, for example, why that would be. At this point, we have no real defined reason why that would be. Any explanation would be speculative at this point.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Is that claim based on the fact that there was a lower rate of screening-in than usual or is it based on an assessment after the fact of applications that didn't screen in that were then assessed in a non-anonymized fashion and then it was determined that, actually, we would normally screen those people in?

[Stan Lee]

That's a very good question. In fact, what you see in the report are the initial decisions. What happens to the candidate after is a different matter, because hiring managers, where they disagree, will sit together and look at it factually and see whether or not the person will go ahead.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

So the claim here that there was a lower screen-in rate is based on an average percentage of candidates who would normally screen in, and it was lower than usual in this case?

[Stan Lee]

No, it's compared with the traditional method. If you look at the table, you'll see that there are two methods to the left, which is the traditional method, which is all the information available, and the second row, which is the anonymized method. It's a strict comparison of the two methods.