Government Operations Committee on Oct. 4th, 2018

[Debi Daviau]

Thank you so much.

The reason I say that is that I do represent IT workers, which lends itself very well to virtual work. As Greg rightfully pointed out, not every job lends itself to virtual work, but a large majority of the jobs do. From our perspective, we believe the government needs to be present in all these small cities and towns across the country. Things such as Service Canada centres, or Canada Revenue Agency outlets are ways for the government to keep in touch with the people. Therefore, it stands to reason that you would have significant resources outside the national capital region.

As mentioned, it's a virtual world. The tools are really there to connect virtually. I do it all the time with my members across the country. I don't necessarily have to run from place to place to make that connection.

To put that in context, the mandate letter for the Minister of Employment talks about promoting alternative and flexible work arrangements. I honestly believe that with the Government of Canada being your workforce, your army, so to speak, you have a real opportunity to invoke those kinds of changes within the public service, addressing these issue of the ability to work virtually and flexibly and from different locations, which helps to recruit and retain the best and the brightest. That's going to help with your next generation of recruits, because that's an attractive environment to them, and it upholds those values that the government is currently trying to set out for all Canadians.

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

Thank you.

The time I have left is very short. Regarding the issue of the rise of the shadow public service, we talked about precarious work and about perpetual contracts and temp work. Can you illuminate a bit more the rise of the shadow public service?

[Debi Daviau]

About $14 billion a year is spent on contracted-out services. We believe that most of those are 100% cost overruns, because the aptitudes and the availability of public service employees are there; you just have to be able to tap into it. The cost is anywhere between two and 10 times more expensive, so it's not even in the government's best interest to go this route.

I honestly believe that if you fix staffing and you make it simpler and easier for good managers to hire good resources when they need them, they are not going to be turning to different budgets, such as the O and M budget, and other processes to get those resources in-house.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Jowhari, you have seven minutes, please.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Mr. Chair, I will be sharing my time with Madam Yip.

Thank you, witnesses. You have all come with a lot of great recommendations around the hiring process, where the challenges are and where the improvements are. Based on the note that the Library of Parliament has prepared, I understand that the joint advisory council brings all the representatives from public sector unions together at least three times a year. This provides a platform for at least the union to be able to represent the concerns and the opportunities for improvement.

When was the last time that the joint advisory council held a session? Were you part of it? Were these opportunities for improvement raised?

[Debi Daviau]

I'll let Debbie answer, because she actually sits on that committee. I have a representative there. However, that committee is doing more information sharing than consultation, so the opportunities to actually submit ideas for improvements are rare. Moreover, it's the Public Service Commission reporting on their initiatives. It's more of a reporting than it is an opportunity for us to get into a meaningful exchange.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Would one of your recommendations be that the role of the advisory committee be expanded to also take input?

[Debi Daviau]

I think it was always intended that it have the ability to consult, to actually do the meaningful collaboration and consultation, but that's not actually what's occurring. You can't really do that three times a year, anyway. You have to be a little more regular about it.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Madam Cooper.

[Deborah Cooper]

The last meeting I was at was in June, but I have switched organizations. I probably just missed one in September or there's one upcoming in a few weeks. Hopefully, I'll be at the next one. It meets roughly three times a year. It's a bit higher level. There are representatives from both sides. There are a number of unions, and the Public Service Commission, and people from Treasury Board and a few other departments, as well.

I would agree with Ms. Daviau that most of it is information sharing. There is an opportunity to provide feedback on policies and initiatives of the Public Service Commission at that advisory council, but usually when it's already at a certain level. It's not ground-level consultation. It's not saying, “We have this blue sky idea, and let's work together to create something.” That part is missing. It's more like saying, “This is the initiative we're working on; here's where we are. Do you have any comments on that? We'll update you the next time we meet as to where we are at that point.” It's a bit more at that level.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you.

I'll go back to Ms. Daviau.

I understand that your institute represents about 60,000 members and 27 different employers in seven jurisdictions. This is from the notes. Are there any best practices among all of these jurisdictions that we could use in the process of improving hiring?

[Debi Daviau]

The vast majority of our members fall into the public sector, even if they're different public sector jurisdictions. The majority of them are in the federal public sector. What we find systemic in the federal public sector, we also find problematic in the provincial public sectors. I'm not sure there's any good example to be had there.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

Let me change the conversation.

A lot of discussion has been around recruitment, which is really around the timing, the challenges, and the sequential nature. You're saying some of them are rightly held and some of them need to be improved. Very few have talked about the actual cost of hiring. What's the actual cost of hiring someone when it takes 197 days? Do you have any idea about the cost that these departments are incurring around the hiring process?

[Debi Daviau]

We have never been privy to the cost. I can tell you that departments are proprietary over those pools, because it costs them a significant amount of money, time, resources, and that comes at an expense to other things that they want to engage in.

I'm not sure what the tally is, but I know it's a significant waste, especially if they're not utilizing the resources that are then identified through those processes for a pool.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

The fact that it costs a lot supports the notion of sharing the pool so the costs could be shared.

[Debi Daviau]

That's part of the problem. Departments have to fund this resourcing themselves. Once they've gone to the trouble of establishing a pool and determining pre-qualified resources, the last thing they want to do is let other departments who haven't paid for that process draw from those pools.

That's the biggest part of the problem. They feel an ownership over the pool they've created because they've paid for it. I think there needs to be a better way to collaborate on the paying and the producing of those pools, so that barrier—

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

I want to give my colleague at a least a couple of minutes to ask a question.

[Jean Yip, Scarborough—Agincourt, Lib.]

No, that's fine. You can keep going.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

You have about a minute left.

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

We've talked about recruitment, but very few of the organizations have come here and talked about retention. Retention also helps us. If we have a proper retention program that talks about proper incentive, path for growth, mobility, flexibility over the work, it helps us with making sure that we maintain and grow the pool.

What are your thoughts about retention?

[Debi Daviau]

Competitive pay.

[Greg Phillips]

Competitive pay and also training.

A lot of word of mouth is given to training in the public service. I touched on it in my presentation. Language training has really suffered. People see a roadblock. They don't meet the linguistic profile. Competitions at the higher level are a certain linguistic level. They're not given time off or time to do linguistic training. That's a roadblock, so they're going to leave.

If they see that they can't advance—

[Majid Jowhari, Liberal, Richmond Hill, ON]

So it's training, as well as competitive compensation.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Panellists, I want to thank you again for being here.

Your advice, suggestions and recommendations are going to go a long way to helping us develop a very good report when that finally happens.

Should you have any further information that you wish to transfer to the committee, I encourage you to do so through our clerk. Any recommendations, suggestions or observations you have would be gratefully accepted, so please do that.

Thank you once again for being here.

Colleagues, we will suspend for about two minutes and come back in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]