Government Operations Committee on Sept. 21st, 2016

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Dubois, colocation is often mentioned in connection with rural areas. Service Canada is present in communities of 5,000 or 10,000 residents, but it does not have any service points in smaller communities, which means that people have to travel longer distances to go to one of its offices.

Can you envisage a possible link between Service Canada and Canada Post?

[Guy Dubois]

The question you are asking provides a good opportunity to show all Canadian men and women that we are there to support them. It is not acceptable to have to drive for two or two and a half hours to obtain a service. Today, we are young—and you are younger than I am—but tomorrow, this will change. At a certain point, we may find ourselves in a rural area and we will need services.

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Fine.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Mr. Blaney, you have the floor.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I read the report with interest. I discussed the banking system possibility with some representatives. The report reads: “Launching a traditional postal bank today would be [...] an expensive endeavour [...]”. Profit potential would be limited, and investments in infrastructure would be required.

Upon reading the report, this does not seem like an interesting avenue. I would like to hear what you have to say on this, because you are really the mail delivery experts.

If I understand correctly, Canadians would be ready to accept mail delivery once every two days, once every three days, or maybe even less frequently, but for parcels it seems it is important that they be delivered. I think Mr. Chopra used the expression “mail-centric”. In my experience, mail and parcels are delivered at the same time. If we break it down, is it a way to modernize, make savings, and adhere to the needs of the people? I'd like to hear you on that.

Maybe Mr. Palecek could respond.

[Mike Palecek]

I think it is a solution to a non-problem, to be honest.

If you only get mail two days a week, you don't have a letter carrier walking up to your front door with empty mailbags the other three days. We have a route measurement system that accounts for fluctuation in mail volumes, and Canada Post is very well situated to adapt to that. Over the last 10 years, as letter mail has begun to decline, the number of letter carriers has declined by the same percentage. That's already built in. If you only get a letter once a week, you only have a letter carrier coming to your door once a week.

Some people get mail five days a week and they rely on that, but if you break the delivery model where they deliver the parcels and letters together, it will become a lot more costly. They can save a lot of money...because what it would mean is you'd have basically two people going up the street every day. In that sense, it makes it more environmentally friendly to deliver.... Actually, Canada Post delivers parcels with the lowest carbon footprint in the industry. They do that precisely because they are able to combine this work and combine efficiencies. That's on a financial scale, but also on an environmental scale and others.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

Does any else wish to comment?

In my case, with a community postal box, nobody comes to my door. It goes to the mailbox.

Are there any comments on that? Is there a real...?

They say that to deliver the mail one day out of two—and I would be fine with that, because it's mainly bills I get—would be a $74-million savings. Is it viable to separate parcels from mail from an operating point of view?

[Howie West, Work Reorganization Officer, Programs Branch, Public Service Alliance of Canada]

I think there's a methodological inconsistency in the question itself, in the notion that people, if they're getting mail five days a week, don't want mail five days a week. I think that opinion is very much qualified by the fact that a lot of those people may indeed have postal mailboxes.

Do I want to go to my community mailbox five days a week in the winter? No, I don't, because I have to buy a lighter and heat up the key to get into it sometimes. I don't want to go through that bother. If that mail came five days a week to my mailbox, which I get five days a week, do I want it? Yes.

I think the notion that the community mailboxes are there needs to be taken into account when we look at that statistic. Going back to what Mike said—

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

I would have it seven days a week, if I could. It's whether there are other ways. I understand that we want to find a way—and this is in the report—to seek sustainability. That's why I believe these issues have been brought to the table, in my view.

In an ideal world, I would receive mail every day and even on weekends, but as others have pointed out, there are people who do that. I wonder if it is profitable. These are some of the questions that are being asked.

Am I done, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

We'll have to hold off on that answer, if you wouldn't mind.

Madame Shanahan, please, for five minutes.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll be sharing my time with Ramez. I'll give him two minutes.

I want to start off on a positive topic. We heard yesterday how much Canadians appreciate Canada Post, and are satisfied with the current level of service, but I think it's that trust level that they have in visiting their post office, in seeing their delivery person; we know that's not sustainable right now, and there have to be some changes.

One suggestion that was provided was to turn Canada Post offices into community hubs. What additional services would you propose to make corporate post offices attractive to citizens in rural communities who tend to congregate in these locations? As it is, people go to collect their Revenue Canada paper-based documents—although that may be disappearing very soon as well—and you mentioned passports, social insurance number applications, EI, and so on. What do you see?

[Mike Palecek]

We can see a variety of services. A lot of them would have to be locally developed when we're talking about community hubs.

The reason we put some of these ideas forward is that post offices are already real centres in their communities. It could be a good opportunity to showcase, for example, the work of local artists or small businesses. A variety of things could be done. It's mostly recognizing the role that the post office already plays in a lot of these small towns. When you have the largest retail network in the country, the options are wide open as to what could be brought into that retail network.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Could I ask whether there have been any studies as to what other services could be provided?

If you don't have the answer, Mr. Palecek, maybe somebody else could interject.

[Guy Dubois]

If there is one, we don't know about it.

I'd like to get back to what I was saying, regarding the fact that the report mentions that Canadians are not favourable to the massive layoff of employees.

In order to avoid that, I think that solutions should be found jointly with the employer. We all have some ideas in that regard. In order to explore these avenues, we have to sit down together to study the problem and see how we could save Canada Post, and make sure that that corporation is viable. We have to avoid negative effects.

Pleasing everyone is not going to be easy, but I'd like to get back to what I was saying earlier, which is that it would be desirable to sit down with the employer and try to come up with something together with him.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you.

Mr. Ayoub.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to be quick, because I only have two minutes.

There is a crisis of confidence. That is my reading, and what I perceive in the report. This is unfortunate. It is clear that trust has to be rebuilt with the authors of the report and with upper management.

Have you held any meetings since the five-point action plan was released to see what could be done and to plan for the future? Have there been any meetings on this since the five-point action plan was published?

[Mike Palecek]

There have been no meetings with senior management and myself since the task force report came out, although we have set one up and within the next couple of weeks we'll be meeting with Mr. Chopra to discuss this.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

The action plan was put in place at least two years ago. There has been a change of government, and currently communication and briefing sessions are being reinstated for you, and also for Canadians.

Mr. Dubois mentioned that you were not aware that the employee pension plans were going to go into deficit. I was surprised to hear that, because normally the unions and the upper management of an enterprise, public or private, speak to each other and follow the evolution of the pension plan.

[Guy Dubois]

We meet twice a year.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

We have only a few seconds left, sir.

[Guy Dubois]

During those meetings, we discussed pension plans and certain other issues. I have been sitting at the national level for seven years, and yet no one ever banged on the table and told us that things were not going well and that we had to talk about it.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you.

We will go to our last three intervenors: Mr. Blaney for five, Mr. Robillard for five, and we'll finish off with Ms. Trudel for a three-minute round.

Mr. Blaney, please.

[Steven Blaney, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

To follow up on what Mr. Ayoub was saying, how can we deal with the problem if we are not made aware of it?

I'd like to go back to a paragraph on page 63 of the Canada Post in the Digital Age report. It startled me. It reads as follows: “In the absence of major business and operational changes, as well as reduction in pension costs and funding, Canada Post's financial self-sustainability is not achievable in the medium and long terms.”

It certainly is not pleasant to hear the boss or the employer say that you have a problem and are really in hot water. I'd like to hear your point of view on that, Mr. Dubois.

I think that the committee is going to have to recommend improvements. I am thinking again of the governance structure and the best possible potential solutions. In my opinion, the workers should be part of the solution regarding the avenues to be considered, and should be doing so in cooperation with Canada Post management.

Finally, I would like to know how you view attrition in connection with the challenge being faced by Canada Post. I'll start with Mr. Dubois.

[Guy Dubois]

Could you reformulate your question, please?