Human Resources Committee on May 14th, 2015

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

What we've heard from a great number of witnesses is the concern around measurement and trying to get a handle on success, or the lack thereof, on outcomes. That seems to be the challenge: measuring it. If the government is contracting with another firm to provide those sorts of outcomes, how good are we at measuring those types of outcomes? I don't imagine in public you're going to say that we suck at it or whatever, but how good are we at ensuring that we're getting value for dollar with contracting out?

[Siobhan Harty]

Right now we don't do any of it. We don't typically measure outcomes. We tend to measure outputs in the context of our grants and contributions programs. I'll give you an example within my ministry of where we are, I think, quite adept at being able to measure things because we deal with social outcomes all the time. For instance, in my directorate we do poverty measurement. We measure labour market outcomes in my ministry. We have a research function that allows us to determine what the risk factors are for somebody who might have a poor labour market outcome, what the risk factors are for a young adult who's going to drop out of high school or post-secondary education. There's a large body of research in this country and internationally that would allow us to measure those things.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Do you see a need for growth within your department? If you're going to develop these partnerships and this contracting out, do you see a need to acquire that skill set within your department to be able to assess those things?

[Siobhan Harty]

We have the skill set.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

You have the skill set?

[Siobhan Harty]

Yes, because we are very—

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

And you have the resources?

[Siobhan Harty]

We have a very strong research function within our department already. We have a very strong evaluation function within our department. Both of those are applied social sciences. We already measure things in the context of our program evaluations and in the context of our research. We are doing right now, for instance, some pay-for-performance related to labour market issues. To be able to set the appropriate outcomes, we're drawing on the body of research that we've already done within the department, but also that has been done, say, in the university context or with partners outside.

I think we can have faith that there is already in the social sciences a large body of research upon which to draw. We know the risk factors for many poor outcomes.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

If we grow this sector, and we see this as a way forward, do you see the potential to replicate the measurement models? Do you see those best practices being easily applied in other sectors?

[Siobhan Harty]

Yes, I do.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Without much growth in resources.

[Siobhan Harty]

I do. Also, I think I said earlier that the more you do, the lower the costs become. As I said, there are already large bodies of research upon which to draw, but also thinking in the federal context, we already do a lot of cross-jurisdictional work. For instance, with the provinces and territories my team co-chairs a poverty advisory committee. We already look at all these things across the country. We look at the interactions between employment insurance and social assistance. We know how people go back and forth across those programs. We have the data. We understand people's life paths and what those risk factors are.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

This is the “opinion-ish” part, okay?

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Do you see limits to the things that you believe absolutely have to be kept in-house? Do you see limits within the sector?

[Siobhan Harty]

Which sector, government?

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

In social financing.

[Siobhan Harty]

In terms of measurement?

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

No, no, not so much in measurement, just in delivery of programs.

[Siobhan Harty]

No, I can't comment.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

That's an opinion.

How much time do I have?

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

You have about three minutes left. It's a seven-minute round.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Oh, that's right, yes, yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Actually, two.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Like Pavlov's dogs, you want start to wind down at four and a half minutes.

A number of concerns have been raised by some of the witnesses around the SIBs of higher costs of government, a fear that there may be a movement rather than any innovative programming, more proven, you know, picking off low-hanging fruit. Is there any way that governments or your department would be able to curb against that? Would it be ongoing evaluation? What would it be?