Government Operations Committee on March 12th, 2026

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

We're not here for debate. You had your comments. I'll have mine.

I want to talk about the comprehensive expenditure review. Under modernizing government operations, the theme is “increasing the efficiency of back-office and administrative functions, leveraging new technology, and limiting spending on discretionary travel and training, and the use of external consultants”. While we've heard some of the witnesses today say that there's been an increase in external consultants, that in fact is not accurate. There's been a 10% decrease. The direction by Treasury Board is also to ensure that we look at internal expertise before any external consultants are hired and to focus as well on expanding that internal expertise. The information put forward by witnesses today is not entirely accurate. I needed to correct that for the record.

There's the streamlining of program delivery to improve services and reduce duplication. There's the recalibrating of government programs to better provide on the priorities that Canadians are looking for. If we look at ways of finding savings, we heard one of the witnesses today say that they believe investing in the federal public service is important to economic growth. We've seen a 40% increase in the size of the federal public service over the last decade. In terms of the reduction we are looking for in the size of the public service to bring it to a sustainable level, even with that reduction there will be a significant increase in the size of the public service compared to 10 or 12 years ago.

With that in mind, if government is looking at providing a more efficient government for Canadians, where the focus will be on services for Canadians, the direction under the comprehensive expenditure review is to ensure that the impact on frontline services is minimized, or that there is a focus on frontline services. Knowing that there's been a 40% increase in the size of the public service, and that there's been a 10% decrease in the last budget for consultants over the previous year, with a focus on ensuring that public servants who have the expertise get that work, as opposed to external consultants—that is the focus—wouldn't you agree that the size of the public service has to be sustainable? It has grown exponentially over the last 10 or 12 years.

[Sean O'Reilly]

I really appreciate the question. If you look at the public service of the eighties and nineties, per capita we're actually smaller than we were back then. We've actually reduced in size from that. I want to thank the government for investing in the public service over the past decade. It has been really appreciated.

The issue is this. Our fear is that we don't have the details. We speak of these “back-office” cuts, but what we've seen, and what we're afraid of, is that we're going to cut at a time when we need to make Canada stronger. What effects will those cuts have? When I look back to the pandemic, there was a lot of scrambling and rushing to put in place things that had been cut previously—decades ago. We rushed to put them back in place.

It's about having that safety net. We talk about pandemics. Hopefully they happen every 100 years, but we don't know when the next pandemic will hit. That's the thing: With those cuts today, our crisis is tomorrow. That's the big fear we have, because we don't have those details. We don't have those details, and we've been wanting to see them.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Colleagues, before we go to Madame Gaudreau, unfortunately, due to the IT issues, we will not be able to bring PSAC back. I'm going to ask our clerk to reschedule them for a later time. I think it's important that we have their voice. They are the largest representative of the public service. The clerk will advise when that will be.

We will go to Madame Gaudreau for two and a half minutes, please.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

It really is important to hear from her. I hope we can bring her back.

Let's tell it like it is. Parliamentarians want to do things right. We want to help you, and to do that, we have to expose things. That's why people say the opposition only ever opposes. Prove we're not needed. If that is the case, we'll just say everything's fine and all is well. I'm the only one who doesn't seek power, because I represent the province of Quebec and the people in my riding. You need to help us sound the alarm. There are really a number of them to sound.

We're being heard. Now the government needs to decide what it wants to do. I think there might be one government too many, because that wouldn't be necessary in Quebec.

What about the impact? What will we have in three years?

We touched on a number of topics. You have a few seconds to give us the highlights.

[Gregory Harlow]

I've been a federal Crown prosecutor for 18 years. In those 18 years, the cases keep getting more complex. They take longer to prosecute, and there's less and less court time. Now the government is increasing funding for the agencies that send us those files.

You can anticipate that there will be more files that just don't get prosecuted. You can anticipate that more of those files will die in the courthouse because they won't get done within the 18-month limit they have to get done in. You can also anticipate that criminals with deep pockets will beat the Crown, because there are just not enough Crowns to go around. That's what you can anticipate is going to happen.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

We understand that, and it's scary.

Mr. O'Reilly, what do you think?

[Sean O'Reilly]

I'm an IT security professional. I've seen the complexity of IT. It's exponential. The threats the president of SSC was speaking to earlier are getting more complex and more severe.

I'm glad we have all of those public servants inside, but if you start hollowing out those folks.... We have these early retirement packages. There might be folks who have been serving the government for 30 years who decide it's time to go. The biggest fear we have is that we're going to lose core parts of the public service to these voluntary departures. These people want to go to retirement, but we're not replacing them. It's hollowing out, and we don't know exactly where it's going to happen.

I'm worried that we will have large, gaping holes created by this hollowing out. That's a big fear we have. Especially as a cybersecurity person, I fear for myself, our data and Canadians.

Thank you.

[Marie-Hélène Gaudreau, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

We're all scared.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thanks.

We'll go to Mr. Boulerice for five minutes, and then we'll finish with Ms. Rochefort.

Mr. Boulerice, welcome back to OGGO.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to start with a comment. There are people here who work at the heart of public services and services to the public. This is what they do, every day.

And yet, I heard a Liberal member say these people are not telling the truth. I have rarely seen such contempt from a government, this Liberal government in particular, for those who serve the public directly and who know much more than us how things works.

A Liberal member said the instructions were not to touch essential services to the public.

Mr. Harlow, you told us about the cuts to legal defence for veterans.

Is it possible not to touch essential services for veterans?

[Gregory Harlow]

No.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. O'Reilly, six years ago almost to the day, the world stopped because of the COVID‑19 pandemic. You said public safety and public health could be at risk because of the Liberal government's blind cuts to scientific services.

Given these cuts, would we be in a better position now to deal with a pandemic than we were in 2020? Would we be worse off?

[Sean O'Reilly]

I think we're worse off.

Cuts were made at the Public Health Agency of Canada in particular. When the pandemic hit, we depended on these people for vaccines and measures to take to avoid contracting COVID‑19.

As I said, I think cuts to health and science are harmful. We have researchers and scientists. We rarely hear from them, but their job is to conduct scientific research to protect Canadians during such crises.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

What you're saying is Liberal cuts could jeopardize public health and safety.

Is that correct?

[Sean O'Reilly]

It's quite possible.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

We've often heard these cuts are being made blindly. They want to cut 15% everywhere. It's like clear-cutting.

The Liberal government wants to use AI to figure out which positions to cut, which means robots or computers would be making those kinds of decisions.

What do you think about that?

[Sean O'Reilly]

We know AI has bias. They've been working for years trying to get it out. AI is not a perfect thing. It is not a silver bullet. To have that reliance on AI.... I hope AI has not been used to find these cuts—maybe it has. The concern we have is that we have not seen concrete examples of the services Canadians rely on every day, in terms of what's going to be cut. We think we have an idea, but it's unknown at this point. Maybe AI did make those cuts. I don't know for sure.

[Gregory Harlow]

Maybe I'll be proven wrong, but when I ask Siri to play a particular song for me, half the time it still can't recognize the title of the song I've asked for. In spite of pouring billions of dollars into creating a self-driving car, they still can't do it. So how is a computer going to replace a skilled legal expert, with multiple degrees and years of service, who has been trained to do that job effectively?

I have to add this. We're also told that if we do use AI, we're expected to verify its accuracy. Therefore, even if you use AI, you still have to do the work of being certain that it's correct, which really limits the time savings that are involved. I'll leave that to you.

Frankly, I wouldn't want to just say that I let the computer solve the question and that I hope it's right.

[Sean O'Reilly]

I'll add something quickly on AI.

Our members work in AI. They're data scientists. It is a tool that can be leveraged, but it's not there to replace a public servant.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

You said we need to retain our expertise. That would be key to control costs, even in terms of efficiency. It's about being more efficient.

If these cuts are made, people will leave.

Will we be able to retain that expertise? Once it's gone, it'll be hard to get it back.

What do you think?

[Sean O'Reilly]

I couldn't say it better myself.

When those experts leave, it takes years to.... When I joined the public service, I was a CS-1. I learned from the public servants around me, and I built that expertise and knowledge, not just in my IT background but also in how the Canadian government works.

Just to pull someone back in.... I'll use Phoenix as the perfect example. We tried to hire people back, but they didn't want to come back. They left and found other work. When someone takes an early retirement after 25 years in the public service, do you think you're going to get someone back who's going to have that pure knowledge of how things are done and how government actually functions? That's not going to exist, and that's the big fear.

[Gregory Harlow]

Going back to—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I apologize, but we are past our time.

We'll finish with Ms. Rochefort, please.

[Pauline Rochefort, Liberal, Nipissing—Timiskaming, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I really appreciate anyone who defends our public service and who speaks in favour of it. We're a great government. We have a great public service.

Certainly, I think we can all agree that expenditure reviews are necessary at times.

In my riding, I've certainly heard about the duplication with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the provincial food safety authorities, and even at a municipal level with health units. I hear from my constituents involved in agriculture that there is a substantial overlap.

Mr. O'Reilly, could you comment on that, please?