Government Operations Committee on Feb. 11th, 2022

[Manon Fortin]

Absolutely.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

And yet, you can't even explain why 90,274 special ballots were delivered late.

Is that right?

[Manon Fortin]

We can't explain it.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

In 2021, Canada Post notified 44 large business customers of a data breach. Over 950,000 customers were affected. The data at issue had been compromised between July 2016 and March 2019, and 97% of the instances included the recipient's name and address.

I know that the breach was caused by a supplier, but I don't understand why you didn't know anything about it for three years.

Can you tell us something about that?

[Manon Fortin]

We treat electronic data breaches very seriously. When it happens, we have a procedure to follow to inform the staff members who deal with matters like these.

We have been putting more and more measures in place to protect our systems, and they are reviewed on a regular basis. We frequently work with experts.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

I don't have much time left, so I'll move on to my final question.

You spoke at length about Canada Post's investments, but you never really talked about the plan. We never hear about that.

Do you have a plan for returning to a balanced budget or is it rather a profitability plan?

Is the downward spiral still going to continue for a long time?

[Manon Fortin]

As I mentioned before, our dual mandate is to serve Canadians to the best of our ability while being financially accountable.

An opportunity is being presented to us. The needs of Canadians have changed, and this creates an e-commerce opportunity for us. We are therefore spending an enormous amount in this area in order to be able to meet this demand.

We think that making this a top priority will help us return to financial stability.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you very much, Ms. Fortin and Mr. Paul-Hus.

I will now go to Ms. Thompson for five minutes.

[Joanne Thompson, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

Thank you. I'll begin.

I'm really interested to hear from you on those early days of COVID and the beginning of where you clearly had to switch in very short order in a massive organization that is not able to easily transition to virtual work in most aspects.

I'd really like to hear about that, and then, regarding the online shopping reality, this new reality of how we engage in our lives, how that really became so significant in how we live and how we secure what we need on a daily basis. How were you able as an organization to quickly position into that reality and then lead into where we are today, still with omicron and still with staff who are ill, and just being able to manage staffing levels, for a multitude of reasons? Those are sort of the three aspects of the past two years.

[Manon Fortin]

Yes, it has been quite the past two years for everyone, has it not?

Let me start by saying that throughout the pandemic we at Canada Post worked closely with public health and received our guidance on what we had to do and how we had to do it in terms of safety. Our priority to this day, because wave five is still out there, is to keep our people safe and to keep the communities we serve safe through our work.

How we've evolved through that.... Well, we had to implement a number of safety measures. We worked closely with our unions to do that. They include things like providing paid leave for quarantine, for elder care and for child care. We provided enormous amounts of protective equipment for employees, including a CPC-issued mask.

We must have revised about a hundred procedures for our employees. You can imagine as an employee the processes changing day by day, and you must turn around and learn those processes and understand them, but it was to keep them safe and to keep our customers safe. We had to put in new cleaning protocols to make sure we were keeping people safe. We did on-site rapid test clinics and vaccination clinics for our employees and for their families. We implemented our mandatory vaccination practice in line with the federal government.

But there was an impact on operations, for sure. I would say that through the first three waves of COVID, while the volumes were surging, we were able to maintain service at a fairly high level, actually, and to manage by putting safety first. We had all kinds of contingencies that we had to implement everywhere across Canada, but the latest wave, omicron, has been a bit of a different situation for us, as it has been with other companies.

Staffing and coverage have often been a challenge, but more at the local level—not widespread but at the local level. Just to give you an example, in the second week of January, we had our highest number of employees off with COVID or on quarantine. We had 3,500 people on quarantine. We had not seen that since the beginning of the pandemic. We worked hard to keep our service going by putting in contingencies. Our employees stepped up, as they always do, and accepted additional supplementary hours. Some of them even travelled to other communities to help serve those communities.

Through that, we were able, for the most part, to keep the service going. At any given time, we have 6,000 post offices, and we have 55,000 employees, 400 depots and 22 plants. About 20 to 36 post offices at any given time would have been closed because they were stand-alone offices with a single employee, but for the most part we found contingencies or we reduced hours. We worked really hard. Our people were very creative and, of course, they're always so caring about the service in their communities, and they will do pretty well anything to help us manage through that.

I think the second part of your question was around parcel volumes. As I said, parcel volumes shifted completely to a new level and advanced. Where we thought we would have that parcel volume in 2026, let's say, we actually had that in 2021, so that is why we accelerated our investment plans: so we can meet that demand and be able to continue to offer terrific service, a good service, to all Canadians and businesses.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you very much.

We'll go now to Ms. Vignola for two and a half minutes.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Fortin, it's very probable that some of the answers to the questions I'm going to ask you might have to be sent in writing. I'd also like the answers to my previous questions sent in writing. I'll send you all the questions together.

You mentioned drones earlier and I was about to talk about them. I grew up in Fermont. It's called the city, but I'd say it's more of a village in view of the number of inhabitants. It's on the North Shore, where people have a lot of trouble receiving parcels. In some regions, there are people who have not even been receiving their medicines for chemotherapy, diabetes and epilepsy. It's a very serious matter. Drones might be the answer, but it remains to be seen.

If the drone pilot project is considered viable, what are Canada Post's intentions for implementing this service, and how far would your organization be willing to extend it?

How much would that kind of service cost, not only financially, but also in terms of human resources? Would we lose human resources or post offices as a result?

Given that drones are equipped with cameras, would everything possible be done to protect customers' confidential data?

[Manon Fortin]

Those are very good questions.

As I was saying earlier, we tested drones on Saltspring Island near Vancouver, to deal with the same kind of situation you just referred to. As it happens, it was in connection with delivering medicines.

We carried out the test with a drugstore and a provincial government department. It was really no more than a test run. We are early in the exploratory phase.

We are trying to determine whether it's possible to do it now or possibly in the future, and what context and partners we would be able to work with.

I admit that this is not our field. Our strength is our network, transportation, processing, and delivery. We don't really have expertise in technology and drones.

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Why not go out and get this expertise?

[Manon Fortin]

That's exactly what we did in the partnership we established in British Columbia. The test is over and we are now studying the results to see what it might be possible in the future to do with drones.

As for resources, I'm not sure what impact it might have. I can say that for the time being it could be an alternative solution for regions that are difficult for us to reach. We are evaluating whether it might be a way of improving service to these communities.

You can see young people playing with drones sometimes, but commercial drones require pilots working in an office. They're the ones who are flying the drones.

For the time being, with existing technology, we do not have any plans to cut resources.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

On that drones issue, you have to test them in a dirt devil or a plow wind in Saskatchewan before you find out how they're going to work.

We'll now go to Mr. Johns for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you both for your testimony.

I also want to give a shout-out to Benjamin Berman. He represents Canada Post on Vancouver Island. He's helped us navigate some very difficult and challenging times.

Ms. Fortin, I'd like to ask about Canada Post's indigenous and northern reconciliation strategy, specifically the commitment to hire and retain indigenous employees. What lessons has Canada Post learned about community engagement and working with others to make sure that first nations, Inuit and Métis are the beneficiaries of investments in their communities? Do you have any idea how many employees have been hired since the strategy was introduced?

[Manon Fortin]

Okay. Those are a lot of questions.

I'll go back to the community hubs as an expression of our desire to do better. It's not just to do better in our own terms but to do better in terms of what the community needs. In both of those communities, we have invested a lot of time with them to understand what their needs are, to not have a cookie-cutter approach to what the offer will be and to how we will offer it, and to have something that is relevant to them and to what they need. That's the first expression of that.

In our indigenous strategy, as I've said before, we want to be a positive force for change. That includes how we will evolve our indigenous strategy. The first evidence of that is that we were the first Crown corporation to adopt a reconciliation strategy in 2020. We have set aside $1 million to improve postal services in indigenous communities. We are always responding to—

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

I'm running out of time—

[Manon Fortin]

Oh, I'm sorry.

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

—and I'm looking for numbers on how many employees. Do you have any idea?

You also talked about services for indigenous and rural and remote communities. Postal banking seems ideal. You talked about the success of it. Why aren't you doing it?

[Manon Fortin]

On the numbers, we do have numbers and ambitions on how we want the representation of indigenous communities to increase in our workplace. I don't have the specifics with me, but I certainly will make sure that our teams provide you with that information.

In terms of procurement, I do have a number. We have changed our procurement practices to ensure that 5% of our purchases come from indigenous businesses. We have made a commitment—it's not related to recruitment, but we're quite proud of it—to have a truth and reconciliation stamp annually in our stamp program. It's starting in 2022.

[The Chair, Conservative, Robert Gordon Kitchen]

Thank you very much.

We'll go to Mr. McCauley for five minutes.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Great.

Thanks again for all the time you're taking with us.

I want to get back to the kind of difficult spot you're in with the 2018 direction and what the Canada Post act calls for. Is there a political direction given to you that's keeping Canada Post from transitioning?

[Manon Fortin]

My only response would be that we have a financial outlook that has our dual mandate included. That dual mandate is to serve every Canadian address to the best of our ability while being financially self-sustainable.