Evidence of meeting #33 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was mail.
4:20 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
No, not for the current.
Actually, the idea has been floated to merge our pension with that of the public service. I don't know where you take that. I don't see an imminent crash here, something that's going to fall apart.
4:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
No, but you realize what I'm saying. The solvency is there, but your surplus exists because Canada Post has been throwing in extra money to meet the solvency issue, so the current surplus in the pension doesn't really exist.
4:25 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
Okay, so we'll call it a wash.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
I don't expect you to cut a cheque or anything for that money; I just want you to be aware.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
4:25 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
I used to live in the rural areas. I'm well aware of the rural area issues because I used to have a community mailbox. That was the way I received my delivery. We moved into town recently, and I currently reside on my own mail route.
4:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Okay. I'll just say one of the things I mentioned earlier: we have to look at a rural issue and a big-city issue.
Thanks very much.
4:25 p.m.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
I'll start by offering a view of the pension situation that's slightly different from Mr. McCauley's.
It may well be true that concerns about solvency evaluation motivated Canada Post to contribute money to the pension plan and create this surplus on a going-concern basis. Now that it's happened, though, the money is there, so there really is a surplus on a going-concern basis. I think it goes to your point, Mr. Pareis, that the corporation is actually in much better financial shape than its own management sometimes wants to let on.
I want to pick up on the issue of postal banking. I was struck by the fact, Mr. Parkes, that you said your community had lost its credit union and didn't want to lose its post office. Given that you still have the post office, is this idea of postal banking appealing to you? Would it be a good thing if residents in your community could access some basic banking services through their postal outlet?
4:25 p.m.
President, Vermilion Bay, Happy Go Lucky Seniors Club
It would definitely make a big difference.
It happens that since the credit union moved out, that's the ideal building to set it up in, so when are you going to start?
It's a great idea, because for seniors it's a place to do all their business rather than getting in a vehicle and coming to a larger community. They have to come to Dryden. Unfortunately, with the way that situation is, businesses and everybody else have to bring all their banking to the area.
I hear quite a bit of it from the seniors. We have a monthly meeting. Somebody always bends my ear about when something is going to change. It's pretty hard to say it's going to change. We always wish and we always hope. One of our big concerns also is whoever locked that school.... We have about 80 people in there now, and it's a drawing card for people to move into an area like ours because of the fishing, hunting, etc. We're getting a lot of traffic from Manitoba now, but they don't want to come there because there's no banking. If we ever lost the school, it would devastate our community.
However, I think postal banking would be a great idea if it could be worked out.
4:25 p.m.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Thanks very much.
Mr. Pareis, I was going to ask you to comment a bit further on the importance of door-to-door mail delivery. We have a newly elected federal government that is promising to restore home mail delivery. It seems now that there is some doubt about the plan on that front. Could you address that matter?
September 29th, 2016 / 4:25 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
In my comments here I stated that my belief is that we should go with what used to be known as the MMC concept, way back when, in Canada Post—motorized mail courier. It motorizes the letter carrier. It combines the functions of people who used to deliver parcels and deliver mail bags, and also the letter carrier.
That carrier is responsible, with the vehicle, for all the oversized parcels, all the letter-carrier-sized parcels, all the courier items, all the letters, all the flyers, and also for clearing street letter boxes. We agreed it would have been very wise, way back when, if they'd renewed the fleet instead of investing in advanced sorting equipment for letters that weren't going to come anymore.
Canada Post really needs to look at a modern fleet. This would enable carriers to provide all those services and on-demand pickups. That is another item they should really get into, because the couriers do it. If every carrier was motorized, performed all these functions, and was centralized out of a single location, especially in small communities, then you'd have those efficiencies, you'd have those extra business lines. I think this is the kind of thing you're looking for. That carrier would also be able to perform door-to-door delivery by parking and looping.
4:30 p.m.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
This sounds like a really excellent idea. I wonder if you have any insight as to why Canada Post didn't go that way. Was it just a matter of being deterred by the upfront cost of buying the new vehicles? Why not go that route?
4:30 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
I think that's entirely the reason, the cost of the fleet. Any fleet is very expensive to maintain. It needs to be renewed constantly.
However, if we took care to source that fleet from a domestic automaker and pair with somebody like GM or Ford, to produce them in Canada, if they were an advanced hybrid vehicle, we'd get all kinds of crosses happening here in terms of capital, labour, and good service for the public.
4:30 p.m.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
There are lots of good opportunities for economic development and environmental improvements there as well.
We've had some discussion about postal banking, and it's definitely an issue that you've raised. Do you care to say anything more about how that could make better use of Canada Post's existing infrastructure?
4:30 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
I've already mentioned how extensive our network is. I've also commented on how, if we bring everything under one roof and then expand the services we offer from that location, we get efficiencies. I think that's what everyone has been saying we need—efficiencies.
Postal banking is just another one of a suite of things that Canada Post can offer. My general thrust is that instead of contracting constantly, which is what can be seen to be.... Even in business you're not expanding, you're contracting. You're also losing business share. I think that Canada Post should deploy postal banking as part of a suite of different things that they do to increase market share in all different kinds of areas.
4:30 p.m.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
I think that's a really key point. On the previous panel, Mayor Wilson made the point that Canada Post could be a high-cost operation, but a lot of these overhead costs are being paid anyway, so the more services and the more revenue you can generate out of those outlets, the better it's going to be.
4:30 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
Certainly it's all in how you utilize your assets. With that investment in a fleet, we could do all those things from the one location.
4:30 p.m.
Conservative
4:30 p.m.
Liberal
Nick Whalen Liberal St. John's East, NL
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you both for coming. Mr. Weir and I tend to do the dance about what was or was not promised in last year's election, but as we each got elected here, obviously the people in our ridings understood what we were both saying.
I want to let you know that this is a legitimate exercise. We're not prejudging the outcome. We're here to listen not only to what the task force is proposing but also what Canadians are proposing. This might not necessarily include restoration of door-to-door delivery in the places that lost it. It doesn't necessarily include anything. We're here to listen honestly to Canadians and come home with recommendations.
When we look at the task force report, we do see that there is a legitimate financial concern. You cannot deny that letter mail volumes are dropping and that revenue from parcels is not high enough to counteract all of that. If you look at the work that management has done over the last few years, you see that their annual report says they achieved $350 million of annual savings through the transformations they've already undertaken. That is probably one of the reasons their bottom line has not been as bad as one would expect. They're trying to address the situation, but it's difficult.
Mr. Pareis, you've worked a long time in postal services. You worked in sorting and you worked in different aspects, and I'm wondering if you could shed some light on whether or not there's a way to get further savings out of efficiencies in the system as it exists, whether you feel that any of the changes have made the service worse, and whether, even if some costs have been saved, opportunities to grow revenue within the banking system have been removed. Could you speak to us a little bit about that from your experience?
4:30 p.m.
Member, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, As an Individual
Certainly.
What the change in local sorting and transportation schedules around northwestern Ontario has done has actually been well covered here today.
In Dryden, a very short time ago, it was possible to mail a letter at 4:59 p.m. on a Thursday evening and have that letter delivered across town or within the region the next day. This was possible simply with the same level of staffing we have now. However, because of the need for justifying this sorting machine that they've installed in Thunder Bay, now the entirety of the region's mail is trucked to Thunder Bay, sorted, and returned to the region. If you want to talk about greenhouse gases and unnecessary waste of labour.... Canada Post is crying about labour costs and they're trucking all of our mail to Thunder Bay. This boggles the imagination.
