Government Operations Committee on June 18th, 2026

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

That's incredible. You've been here a number of times over this last session, and it strikes me that you appear to be much more positive and optimistic in this meeting so far today, which is great to see.

Maybe I'll give you that opportunity. You seem to have some ideas and some, as you've said, innovation in the pipeline. I'd love to hear what that entails.

[Doug Ettinger]

Thank you for that opportunity. I'll get to that really quickly so I don't chew up too much time.

First of all, the announcement last fall, taking the fetters off of us that have been there for a long time, was amazing. We're so pleased and grateful that the government decided to take this seriously for the good of Canada and not just for the sake of doing it. We connect all Canadians. We're in every community. We live in every community. Who's better than us to do a better job for Canadians, especially right now?

The other thing is that the agreement we were able to negotiate at the table with the union was a breakthrough for both parties. We both had some give-and-take in that process. It's not a perfect deal, but it's a transformative deal for the organization going forward. Now, as I said, we can do weekend delivery. We can compete with the big, global players that are out there.

Also in the works are some things that I've been excited about for some time. We're going to launch a new online marketplace for Canadian retailers and Canadian small businesses. It's going to be very friendly, with low fees and low costs. It's really aimed at small businesses and trying to help Canadian small businesses get up and running.

We're also going to announce home pickup at consumers' homes for parcels they want to ship—I'm referring to small businesses—and returns. They may have ordered three T-shirts and they only want to keep one, so we're going to do that.

I'm very excited, because we were tough on small businesses. I want to apologize to Canadians and small businesses for the tough times over the last two years. We were in disruption for over 220 days over the last two years with a variety of issues. They took it hard. We owe them and we need to earn back their trust. We're going to have a new program on small businesses. There's a lot coming this fall. There's some new pricing for them, how to set up a website, insight and value-added kinds of programs. We want to partner with small businesses. That's our sweet spot. We partnered with Shopify when they were very small, way back in the day, and we'd like to see more Shopifys around Canada.

There's more. Some aren't quite ready for prime time yet, but we're going to have a lot of announcements in the fall. They won't be just on transformation, but on real customer innovations that are going to make it easier for them to work with us.

Thank you.

[Jenna Sudds, Liberal, Kanata, ON]

That's incredible. Thank you.

That's my time. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

You're at the six-minute mark.

Madam Gaudreau.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good morning, Mr. Ettinger. Thank you for being here.

I have to tell you that I'm uncomfortable. You received the mandate on September 25, 2025. It is now June 18, 2026. Today is the last day of parliamentary business. This committee has waited until now to get some interesting information. You are appearing before us during one of the biggest transformations at Canada Post in a generation, as you said.

Nonetheless, parliamentarians, municipalities, workers and citizens still don't have a detailed plan of what is being implemented. There are just press releases and media advisories that we get on our iPhones. It's quite disappointing for the partners. We don't have a clear timeline. There is no public follow-up on the recommendations from the Kaplan report. We don't have a clear picture of the measures that have already been taken and those that are yet to come. You mentioned that.

Why do we have to chase down information all the time?

[Doug Ettinger]

Thank you for your question.

That's a good question.

I totally understand what you're saying. I feel for you and your riding, which could have a number of changes.

I can assure you that we want to move with the support of the communities. Our team has engaged in the communities. As I said, we were at the recent conferences for both the Quebec federation of municipalities and the Canadian one. We got a lot of feedback there. We're hearing from mayors. I'm hearing from mayors.

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

Mr. Ettinger, my concern is not just about the content. It's also the way it's being conducted. It seems that some decisions are being made behind closed doors or are revealed in dribs and drabs when they may already have been made.

Do you understand why many observers feel that this transformation is taking place behind the scenes rather than in the open?

Can you provide the committee with a comprehensive document today that includes all of the recommendations from the Kaplan report that you will be implementing, their current status, their timeline for implementation, the consultations done, in detail, as well as the expected impact on services, workers and communities?

[Doug Ettinger]

Thank you.

Again, I fully understand. Our guiding principles for this transformation are to enhance service, make changes with respect, be thoughtful, be flexible, keep stakeholders apprised and engaged and protect—

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

Mr. Ettinger, the answer is yes or no. Will you table all of that with the committee?

[Doug Ettinger]

Everything that has been approved for us has been announced.

On the community mailboxes, the first 600,000 addresses and 51 communities have been released. Our team is working with all of those communities to figure out how best to do it, and we have a process for that.

On the post offices, we have started our assessment of the various regions around Canada. We're doing an assessment based on a community lens—

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

How is it that—

[Doug Ettinger]

We're also starting our research with the surveys to customers.

You may want to follow up with the government.

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

With all due respect, Mr. Ettinger, this is Parliament. Canada Post is a Crown corporation.

I meet regularly with mayors, reeves and elected municipal officials, and that's not what they're saying. They're wondering what's going to happen. They're looking for information. Even we, as parliamentarians, are asking questions without getting a clear answer.

Can we have the respect of a Crown corporation? I heard the word “business”. It's not a business.

Will you commit today to providing this committee and parliamentarians with all the details of the current reform?

[Doug Ettinger]

That is under the purview of our department, PSPC. It has not been fully approved. That's my understanding. We talk to the government frequently about that. I can't give that today.

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

When will you do it?

[Doug Ettinger]

I cannot give that to you today, but rest assured we are working hard on it. We have a plan that's been submitted.

There are no surprises in that plan. It is all of the things that other countries around the world have faced and what they're doing, and all of the things we need. We're going to do it very thoughtfully, with Canadians, and make sure that we're in the communities.

That's all I can say here today.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

That's really disappointing.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thanks.

We'll go to Mr. Stevenson for five.

Welcome to OGGO, Mr. Stevenson.

[William Stevenson, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you. This is my first time here at OGGO. It's my pleasure.

I've been talking to my colleagues, and my whole reason for coming today is that you guys are here.

I was quite pleased that you were in a positive mood earlier, and I hope you can keep that going. I have several questions. What I'll do is ask a bunch of questions so that you can decide if somebody else needs to answer them. Then I'll go back through the reason I have them. If you don't get through all of them, maybe you can provide the answers in writing.

To start with, how many customers or postal recipients would you have in a postal code? How big of a geographic area would you say you have for a definition of a postal code? What range of numbers of customers would there be? Certain postal codes have from 20 to 1,000 or 10,000. How many people are actually going to fit in there? What are the criteria for Canada Post having to create a new postal code for a certain area? If you have that, is it publicly available? Can the public find out about that? If a citizen, a company or a neighbourhood would like to have their own postal code for whatever reason—and I'll get into that—how do they go about that? What's the process? Those are the questions I have to start with.

In today's digital age, postal codes have become very important to Canadians, to their lives. It affects their banking, financing, insurance and many government programs. With insurance, rates will often be based on the crime rate in a certain area, and then they'll say their insurance rate will be a certain amount. If they have a fire department in the postal code, then their insurance rates are.... The postal code can be affected in various different areas.

One of the programs that you'll probably recall was very dependent.... In my riding of Yellowhead, for probably 90% plus, everybody's driving to the post office to get their mail. Delivery is not the issue. It's more about where they are. Previous to last year, before the last election, the consumer carbon tax rebate was based on where you.... If you filed your income taxes, there was a checkbox for whether you were urban or rural, and they would often correlate that with your postal code. In my riding, there is a specific area—Waiparous, Ghost Lake and Ghost valley—directly west of Cochrane. They have to drive 20 to 40 minutes to get to Cochrane where their mail is. That's not the issue for them.

When you look specifically at that carbon tax one, and many other programs and social services, Cochrane fits with the Calgary urban riding. They live outside of that. They technically should have received the 10% bonus because of living in the rural area. Their postal code often would have them denied that, and it was a major fight. Having a postal code out in that area, even if it was still in Cochrane, the delivery postal code would actually make the difference for them.

The people of that area created a petition last year. I presented it in the House. I also gave it to the minister. I got no response from the minister. It didn't get to as high a level as you, but I sent it to Canada Post. The response that we got from Canada Post was that these people get postal delivery, and that's as far as they're going to go for now.

However, today, with your remarks, I'm encouraged that you're saying you're really looking at where they're going to have post offices and where they'll have delivery. First of all, I'm wondering if you actually got any response from the minister on this. I somehow doubt it.

Perhaps you could elaborate on what that process will look like going forward. How can we help these people so that they can get their own postal code?

[Doug Ettinger]

That's understood. Thank you. There are a lot of good questions in there.

I apologize, but I have to admit that this is the first time I have heard of this.

[William Stevenson, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Yes, I assumed that. That's why I'm here and all gung-ho.

[Doug Ettinger]

You could probably read my body language very carefully.

We will take that back and look at it. There may be some people behind me who work on all of these issues. I'll make sure we get back to you, sir, and give you.... I'm not sure how the process works.

With the changes to post offices that we're potentially looking at over time, there's no plan to change postal codes. It was more about post offices. From time to time, we do get questions on why one area is deemed urban and one is deemed rural and they're very close to one another. That is the kind of question I've received before. We do take a look at those because sometimes it's deemed to be unfair. It may even be that shipping costs are different between rural and urban. That is the kind of question I've heard before. We do look into those and see what we can do, if it's appropriate to change them, because communities change.

[William Stevenson, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Yes. That's exactly it. I know that in Cochrane, where they get their mail—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Mr. Stevenson, you've used up the time for a response.

[William Stevenson, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

I'm sorry.