Thank you for the question and the comments about my members and their work.
Employees at Service Canada centres are among some of the hardest working in the federal public sector. As you can appreciate, the clients who come in are too often hostile and emotional. They're looking for money to put food on the table for their families. My members have been spat at and have had computers thrown at them in the last few years, so there has been increased security in these offices. We always welcome the appreciation of these workers because of the type of work they do in serving Canadians.
I have a few things to say.
I had the privilege of working for the federal government for 10 years before I got into this position, and I remember—I'm from Vancouver—I was flown to Ottawa and had to sign a pledge to the Queen. I'm Catholic, so I had the fear of God in me and was scared over the possibility of risking information, private information and so on. When I went home, I remember going to my parents' place. They had a big supper for me because everyone was so proud that I was a Government of Canada employee. My family came to this country as asylum seekers from Chile, so the privilege of working for the government that welcomed us here was huge.
When you contract out public services, the workers are not going to have the same level of values, ethics and dedication built into them that a federal government employee would have when they are given benefits and pensions, and have the pride of being an employee of the Government of Canada.
We see that already. I've spoken to former 1-800-O-Canada employees who were, at the time, among those contracted out and who are now Government of Canada employees because they've been brought into the public service. I'll maybe get into that later. They tell me about their job satisfaction. They're happier at work and feel more respected at work. They're treated better. Naturally, because they're happier, the quality of the work they're doing is better.
We also know—and countless studies have shown us this—that in the short term, it might save the employer some money to contract out initially, but long term it costs them money. If you look at 1-800-O-Canada, they recently sold the contract from Quantum to Gatestone, and they had to hire 240 new employees to start again.
My members who deliver employment insurance, for example, working at Service Canada.... A lot of the clients who eventually get to speak to an EI agent started their journey by calling 1-800-O-Canada. More often than not, they were given misinformation or they weren't provided with enough initial help for a simple question. It wouldn't have taken them a week of trying to get through a call centre or queuing up at a Service Canada centre if that first point of contact at 1-800-O-Canada had had some access to the system to look up a simple answer.
I could go on, but I think you get the idea.