Government Operations Committee on Nov. 24th, 2022

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

I'll help you, Minister. You just said you were waiting for a request from the departments to be able to deliver a safe supply. You have different rules for different priorities. You don't need a request. You'll sole source and go ahead with an objective at PSPC that is of urgent nature without a request from the appropriate departments. This is a situation—

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

As far as I'm aware, we require a request from a department.

[Paul Thompson]

If I could help clarify, I believe the member is referring to the contract for the mobile hospital units with SNC-Lavalin PAE. In that case, PSPC was funded directly for emergency acquisitions in support of the pandemic. PSPC became the responsible department to execute that procurement with the advice of other partners.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

That is exactly the question, Minister. Do you see the situation that we're in with the toxic drug crisis as an emergency?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

PSPC only acquired those mobile health units presumably because they were requested by the Department of Health.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Minister, my question to you is this: Do you see this toxic drug crisis as a health emergency?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Are you asking me personally?

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Yes.

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

I'm a physician. I am very distressed at the situation as it relates to the opioid crisis. I am a firm believer in safe supply.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Do you feel your government is doing enough to deliver the safe supply that's needed right now to Canadians who are struggling?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

I will continue to have conversations with the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions. It is a topic of concern for a number of us.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Okay.

Minister, today CBC is reporting that the MyMoney Loan program offered by Canada Post, in partnership with TD Bank, has been paused after being launched just last month. Concerningly, it is being reported that loans under the program were being offered at rates of up to 20%, much higher than traditional lines of credit.

Postal banking could reduce systemic inequalities in communities that lack bank branches. Many banks are pulling out of rural communities, as you know, despite the fact that they're having record profits—especially communities like the majority of those in Nunavut. I've talked to you about this, and the importance of this to my colleague from Nunavut, Ms. Idlout. However, it simply can't accomplish this goal if punitive interest rates are offered to pad the profits of a big bank.

As the minister responsible for Canada Post, can you please explain how you will ensure the program is serving communities rather than wealthy executives and shareholders, and that it delivers this absolutely critical service to remote and rural communities across Canada?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Mr. Johns, as you know, Canada Post is a stand-alone, arm's-length corporation from government. Indeed, there is clearly a role for me as minister responsible to answer to Parliament for their activities. To that end, I am anticipating very shortly a meeting with the CEO of Canada Post. We will be reviewing their proposed business plan.

It will obviously include, as I understand, the proposal. Some of these community hubs or post offices offering loans through TD bank do exist. I will want to hear more about their business plan and how that goes—

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

I appreciate that, Minister, and I hope that you'll provide the necessary resources to Canada Post so that they can deliver. It's important for reconciliation.

This has been a challenging fall for parents of young children as they have grappled with ongoing shortages of pain and fever medications amidst an intense season of respiratory illnesses. These shortages began many months ago, and we're only now beginning to see action from the federal government.

Has PSPC been involved in the procurement of imported medications for children? If so, when was PSPC first engaged on this issue?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

I don't believe PSPC was in any way involved. Perhaps the deputy—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I'm afraid that's our time.

Thanks very much.

Mrs. Kusie, go ahead for five minutes, please.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here today, Madam Minister.

Minister, I want to have a conversation again about the status of Phoenix. We know that although $2.1 billion has been put towards the Phoenix system at this point, there's still a significant backlog. I'm hoping you can tell the committee the status of the Phoenix backlog and how many public servants are still affected by this disaster.

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

Mrs. Kusie, you can imagine that I'm just as frustrated as you are with the Phoenix situation. Canadians are. Employees are. Many of the affected employees have been distraught. They deserve to be paid accurately, on time and so on. As for the exact number in the backlog, I know, obviously, it has increased recently because of the volume of need of individuals who have been employed through the pandemic. There has been an increase in FTEs acquired by the government and, therefore, an increase in the number of transactions. Perhaps the deputy has the precise numbers.

We're certainly making progress overall, but as the volume has increased, the numbers in the backlog have also.

Mr. Deputy, please give us the exact numbers.

[Paul Thompson]

Thank you.

We have indeed seen an increase in the backlog. The number of cases, beyond our normal workload, that have a financial impact on employees has grown to be in excess of 200,000, which is much higher than we're comfortable with. As the minister noted, we are making significant progress. We are closing more cases than ever before, but the volume of transactions coming into the pay centre has gone up more quickly than our capacity to deal with it has, hence this growth in the backlog. We are taking a multipronged approach to continue to work down that backlog over the coming months.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Thompson.

In addition, there was a media article released last week about how there has been $500 million in overpayments with the Phoenix system.

What is your plan, Minister, in an effort to recoup those funds?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

I will of course ask for more detail from my officials, but what I've been informed—because obviously, I was very concerned when I heard that the overpayments were part of the issue—is that every effort for flexibility in terms of the individual's situation is taken into account. I did a calculation at some point, and I believe the average overpayment is in the order of about $4,000, but obviously, payments would vary tremendously. For the specifics of the mechanics of how we manage it, I've certainly urged our officials to ensure that they work with the individual and make it a reasonable process in terms of repaying the amount owed.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Minister.

In addition, there's been some discussion about a new generation system. Can you give a status update, please, as to when we can expect this new generation system?

[Helena Jaczek, Liberal, Markham—Stouffville, ON]

The new system that is being studied carefully through pilots is called NextGen, and I understand that pilots were started in a number of departments in the government to see how it would work. I believe Canadian Heritage, Fisheries and Oceans, Indigenous Services and Crown-Indigenous Relations are involved. We're studying very carefully how it's working. One certainly wouldn't want to go live on a system unless it was absolutely thoroughly tested, and that's what I've been assured is happening. Perhaps Sony could provide a little bit more detail.

[Sony Perron, President, Shared Services Canada]

Yes, we are testing a commercial solution, which is a tool that is used by private sector and public sector organizations across the world. We have pre-qualified four vendors that are in the top quadrant—they are the best in the world at doing this—and we are testing right now with one against the complexity of the public service to make sure that we don't get into a place where we try to adopt a system and then at the end we find that we have to invest in technology.

The hypothesis is that there may be a way to adapt the way we work to adopt a solution like that, so we can benefit from that type of technology. Testing is under way. We did a paper exercise to compare the complexity. Now we are testing the workflow, the process and the complex transactions. We will be landing in our testing probably by somewhere in the middle of summer 2023, and then we will be working on a recommendation with respect to how feasible it is to migrate toward this kind of solution.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I'm afraid that's your time.

Minister, would you have enough time to stick around for Mr. Bains' final round?