Evidence of meeting #35 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.
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
The information I received from the president of the students' union was that there was a meeting and it was considered public consultation. We were not invited.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
I thought I had said 2011 because that was leading up to the five-point plan.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
The five-point plan was in 2011.
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
Then if they were in 2013, I'm not aware of it.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Later on in your conversation you said there was very little consultation. You've gone from none to very little. If there was very little, what do you term very little? Can you fill us in on what was done then if there was very little? To me that sounds as if there was some.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
No. There may have been consultation. As I've said, I found out from the president of the students' union. There could have been many consultations that were not advertised, such as this forum here.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
It's one of the issues that we're running too. We're running crazy for three weeks straight. We'll get to 25 cities; that leaves 3,000, 4,000 cities that we can't get to. Unfortunately, it's the same with Canada Post.
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
On your form that you put in place, with the questions of the week and people putting in submissions, we weren't even privy to it at that time. Yes, your public consultation process is limited, but everybody I'm aware of had an opportunity to put forth, and if they weren't able to attend today, they were able to put forth submissions and answer questions. To me, that's a public consultation.
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
There was previously a spot, but maybe it was just not advertised enough.
Did you see the task force recommendations? It was quite a heavy report of some 80-odd pages. You read through it?
7:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
They paint not the strongest future for Canada Post, showing $750 million in losses, I think, in 2026. I'm asking as we go across.... People are not keen on paying higher taxes. They don't want to pay more for the stamps, but they want the services. It's always “We want everything, but we want someone else to pay for it”, but we know that's not going to happen.
Where do you see the solution? Let's put postal banking aside. Where do you see a solution if we have a $750-million minimum deficit coming in a very short period?
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
As you heard in my opening statement, since I've been here, I've been told the sky is falling. The Conference Board of Canada projected major losses for the last couple of years, and obviously those projections were wrong, because we are very profitable.
What I see is that the feasibility of Canada Post in the future is to manage properly. In my opinion, Canada Post management has no accountability to anybody, and they should be accountable to the Canadian government.
A couple of days ago, there was an article in the newspaper saying that the 28,000 people who lost their service last October are now going to get lock changes. Nobody thought to do the research and say that Newfoundland has some really wet and freezing weather, so now the corporation has put it out that 28,000 people will get lock changes. That same news article said that there were 65,000 complaints.
7:20 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
Obviously, if they had done their homework, they could have saved, just in little old St. John's, possibly a million dollars.
We see it on a daily basis. I work as a letter carrier. We see the money they spend.
My focus here today is the quantum of overtime. When you have a worker working overtime at $30,000 to $50,000 annually, that could be another job. That's also an effect on the service, because today in St. John's they are working later. I just got a report that six letter carrier routes didn't get delivered. That's a violation of the standards and the code. Today, in 2016, six routes didn't get covered because they didn't have enough workers.
7:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
So you believe that the $750 million.... Well, I guess you don't believe it.
Canada Post made a limited amount of money last year. It could be argued that it was because of the stamp price increase and the 50 million who were switched to community mailbox savings. If you take that away, yes, Canada Post did lose money in a very strong revenue year.
You don't believe going forward that the revenues are going to drop, as the Conference Board has said or as Ernst & Young has said?
7:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
I'm not trying to badger. I'm just trying to get your opinion without—
7:25 p.m.
President, Local 126, Canadian Union of Postal Workers
My opinion is that Canada Post is very mismanaged. We deliver two out of three parcels from coast to coast to coast. Most of the major courier companies use us for the last mile, because they will not provide the service to rural communities in Newfoundland and Labrador. There's a vibrant future for Canada Post if we're managed correctly.
As I said, I'm a letter carrier. Last year at Christmas, we worked 24-7 from the middle of November in delivering parcels. Our parcel delivery has gone through the roof.
7:25 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Right, so you do accept, obviously, on the other hand, of course, the—