Human Resources Committee on May 30th, 2022

[The Chair (Mr. Robert Morrissey (Egmont, Lib.)), Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Committee members, we'll reconvene the meeting for the second-hour portion.

Welcome to the meeting, Minister Gould. Before we begin, I'd like to make a few comments.

As you are aware, witnesses can choose to speak in the official language of their choice. If there's an issue with the translation, please get my attention and we'll suspend while it's clarified. I would also advise those appearing to direct their questions through the chair. We will later proceed with rounds of questioning.

Again, I want to welcome Minister Karina Gould, Minister of Families, Children and Social Development, and from the department welcome Lori MacDonald, senior associate deputy minister; Peter Simeoni, assistant deputy minister; and Evelyne Power, director general.

Welcome to the committee. I believe the minister will start with a five-minute opening statement, following which we'll open the floor to questions.

Madam Minister, you have the floor.

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Minister of Families]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and colleagues. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to the committee today about passport service delays.

It's important to acknowledge that we are meeting on the unceded territory of the Algonquin people.

Responsibility for the Passport Program is shared between Service Canada and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, or IRCC.

IRCC manages the policy, forecasting, and systems and program architecture, while Service Canada manages the processing and delivery of passports to Canadians.

Before the pandemic, passport volume was predictable, moving through five-year cycles of low volume, around 2.5 million, and high volume, up to five million. This year, 2022, was forecast to be the last year of low volume before a surge in renewals begins in 2023. These cycles are planned for and forecasted.

The arrival of COVID‑19 in Canada has had two major impacts on the Passport Program.

First, restrictions imposed to protect the health and safety of staff and clients at Service Canada centres have resulted in office closures and limited capacity both in our facilities and in program delivery.

Then, since people were not travelling, they were not applying for passports.

Demand and capacity were aligned. That changed this spring. With travel opening up, the number of passport applications has surged. Not only are we seeing those who would predictably be applying for passports on a five-year cycle. We are receiving applications from those who otherwise would have applied in the previous two pandemic years. We are seeing much of that volume arrive all at once rather than spread out during the year.

Meanwhile, Service Canada still had public health obligations to staff and clients. There was a mismatch between demand and the capacity to meet it. Statistics help tell the story. Beginning in April 2020, for the first pandemic year, Service Canada issued about 360,000 passports. During the next year, Service Canada issued about 1.2 million passports.

This year, in the months of March and April alone, Service Canada received nearly half a million applications. Service Canada now expects to receive 4.2 million passport applications this year.

That's more than three times as many as last year, with a huge proportion of that volume arriving now.

The fact of the matter is that, while we were anticipating increased volume, this massive surge in demand has outpaced forecasts and outstripped capacity. The government is acutely aware of the impact this is having on Canadians. We know that many people have been put in very difficult circumstances. That is why I have directed officials to work as hard as possible to meet the demand and to examine their operations to ensure they're doing everything they can to meet this demand—and officials have acted.

In every corner of the country, our staff are working overtime to help Canadians get their passports. Service Canada is hiring and training even more employees. Since January, 600 new employees have been welcomed to help process applications.

Just a couple of weeks ago, Service Canada was once again able to open all passport service counters. This is about a 40% increase, and it returns our centres to their prepandemic service capacity.

Waiting room capacity has also been significantly expanded, in line with health and safety protocols.

Despite this, processing times remain long, due to the high number of applications.

Ninety-seven per cent of Canadians who apply in person at a specialized passport office receive their passports in fewer than 10 business days. However, in light of the unprecedented volume of passport applications received by mail, about 96% of those who apply by mail receive their passports within 50 business days.

As we announced earlier this year, in response to demand, we have simplified the passport renewal process.

Applicants don't need to have a guarantor or provide their original documents and ID. These changes make renewing a passport easier and faster, while maintaining program security and integrity.

I also ask Canadians who are not planning immediate travel to check the expiry date of their passport.

For Canadians who have no immediate plans to travel, there are over 300 Service Canada centres that are available to receive passport applications in person. No proof of travel is needed.

I do encourage Canadians to check the expiration date on their passports and to ensure they have a valid passport before booking travel, unless, of course, there is an unforeseen emergency.

I also encourage Canadians to go to a Service Canada site so as to avoid accidental errors in their application. Applications by mail often have a rate of 25% with accidental mistakes that require verification and slow down the process.

Mr. Chairman, I want to assure you and members of the committee that Service Canada is working flat out to deliver passports to Canadians as quickly as possible. As members of Parliament, our offices have heard from constituents looking for urgent help, my own office included.

Frustrating situations have arisen at Service Canada centres as staff deal with the rising number of applications.

We know that Canadians are more excited about seeing friends and family and exploring the world outside our borders.

When that excitement bumps up against the reality of long lines and uncertainty, it creates stress and concern, and that is why we will continue to do everything necessary to ensure Canadians receive the service they are entitled to.

Thank you.

I welcome your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madam Minister.

I will now open the floor for questioning, beginning with Madam Kusie.

Madam Kusie, you have six minutes.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you very much, Minister, for being here today.

Minister, you addressed the foreseen demands, but the increase in demand for passport renewals should have been easy for the government to predict, as more Canadians needed to update their travel documents. Further, this is the 10-year anniversary of implementing the 10-year passport. A predictable increase in demand was foreseeable.

You talked about some performance measures. Between April 1, 2020, and March 31, 2021, Service Canada issued 363,000 passports, yet in the same time frame the following year, 1,273,000 passports were issued. This number is still down from the 2.3 million processed between April 2019 and March 2020. Canadians rightfully expect to be able to get basic government services such as passports from the Government of Canada.

Minister, when we look to the media, we see many horror stories, frankly, from Canadians. I have a May 24 story here from Global News. It states:

A B.C. family said they had to shell out $3,000 for a new flight for their family vacation after they didn’t receive all their passports on time.

[Ms.] Ventouras said her family has been trying to plan a trip for a while to go to Orlando, Fla., with [her] niece and nephew.

She said they had let the children’s passports expire during COVID so in February they went in person to apply at the passport office and were told they would receive their passports in the mail by...April or [even] sooner.

Unfortunately, Minister, this states:

They didn’t arrive.

“My husband went. The week we were supposed to leave, he went to Passport Canada,” she said. “We got new passport applications in case they could do an emergency one. He was told we couldn’t get an emergency passport at that time.”

The office...requested the documents be sent to the Service Canada office in Surrey but they could not guarantee that the passports were going to arrive on time.

The week they were supposed to leave, the passports still had not come so...they made the decision to change the flight to leave from Seattle—

This of course also hurts our economy. It continues:

—as children do not need passports to fly within the United States.

The cost of buying new flights on Delta Airlines was $3,000.

[Ms. Ventouras] said Service Canada told her staff are doing the best they can....

We recognize this.

The family also couldn’t claim a flight change refund through travel insurance.

“When there was no responsibility, that was the frustrating part,” she said.

Minister, I have another story. It's about a family who tried to go to Disneyland on a trip for a woman with terminal cancer. Unfortunately, after a passport delay it was put off for some time. The article states:

Ask Barb Walter's family, and they'll tell you the 56-year-old grandmother would give anything for her loved ones.

But since they found out she has terminal cancer, the family said they have been scrambling to give back to her with a trip to Disneyland in California.

They said they want to make the trip as a family so Walter can make lasting memories with her three beloved grandchildren.

I know that as a mother you will appreciate this. It says:

“This could very well be [the] last thing that she gets to do with us as a family while she's still in any capacity to be able to leave the house,” said Brandon Williams, 42, Walter's son-in-law and the father of her grandchildren, speaking from [the] family's home in Hope.

“She wanted to take the family to Disneyland and make this trip happen any way possible. Part of her bucket list.”

But the trip is in question, Brandon said, because of delays getting the kids their passports.

Williams' wife and Walter's step-daughter, Cheyenne Williams, applied in late April for passports for their three kids, ages three to seven—as soon as they found out....

It says, that they applied by priority mail in the Lower Mainland, and their flight from Vancouver to California is set for June 3. I hope they can make that flight.

Unfortunately, we are now seeing this extend into other services, as reported in a May 25 Global News article:

Backlogs and bottlenecks in passport processing through Service Canada appear to be causing problems for clients seeking other core services through the facilities, such as death benefits or employment insurance.

Minister, I looked at the dates of the announcements of the travel restrictions—the ones that should have been lifted—being lifted. On February 15 it was announced that on February 28, fully vaccinated individuals only had to produce antigen tests. April 1 was announced on March 17.

Minister, you had announcements this year regarding day care on March 28 for Ontario and March 31 for Nova Scotia, yet the first article, Minister, came out March 8 on these passport delays, which tells me you didn't prioritize these passports or these Service Canada services, due to your day care initiative. You should have taken care of these Canadians first before you continued this initiative. You should have made the difference in your prioritization.

As a result of that, Ms. Walters may not get to go to Disneyland with her family. The Ventouras family won't be able to go on its bucket list trip without paying another $3,000, Minister.

I wish you would have prioritized things differently as a minister. As I mentioned, in the May 25 article, we are now seeing these passport bottlenecks spilling over to EI and CPP applicants, which has significant effects on our Canadian society.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Unfortunately, Minister, the time is up.

We'll now go to Mr. Long for six minutes, please.

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Thank you, Chair.

Good afternoon to my colleagues.

Minister, thank you so much for coming before HUMA today.

Before I start, I want to thank you for the national child care program. It's unbelievable the impact it's having on families right across the country, but in particular, my riding of Saint John-Rothesay. Families are literally saving thousands of dollars per year. I want to thank you for your leadership on that. It's a transformational program, and you should be very proud of it.

With regard to passports, Minister, do you have any specific advice for Canadians who are planning their summer vacations and now realize they need to get their travel documents in order?

I've heard from many constituents. Obviously, we've all gotten calls, but in my riding of Saint John-Rothesay, my constituency staff have been dealing with a high volume of calls on this issue. Individuals who applied within an appropriate time frame are being bumped by those who are applying at the last minute. I've also heard that those who applied for renewal and who indicated that their upcoming travel was via land border and not via air have not been dealt with as quickly.

Due to this, many of my constituents are becoming very nervous, especially after media reports of long waits. They want to make sure we let them know the best way to proceed, so that their documents get processed in time.

Minister, what message would you like to send Canadians? What's the best approach here? What do you recommend that Canadians do to ensure they receive passports in time for travel, and what do you recommend to those who are still waiting?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Long.

Maybe I can start by addressing some of the things Ms. Kusie said, because she took up the whole time.

Some of those stories are heartbreaking, and we understand that this is challenging for Canadians. In that instance, if someone has urgent travel in that regard, I would recommend that they contact their member of Parliament. There is an MP line that can contact Service Canada directly. We want to avoid any of those situations. If you have that kind of urgent travel and you haven't received your passport, and it's seven days out and you replied ahead of time, please do contact your MP so that we can address those issues. For those who have contacted us that way, we have been able to get their passports in time, because we don't want that situation to occur.

With regard to your questions, Mr. Long, for anyone who has urgent travel, travel within 45 days or less, we recommend that the best way to get your passport in a timely manner is to go to a specialized passport office.

One of the changes that has happened is that, prepandemic, we would see about 80% of passport applications coming in through passport offices and about 20% by mail, but in the pandemic, that ratio has flipped. We are now back at full capacity at passport offices and have the ability to process in person at a much quicker rate. For in-person services, you see 97% of people receiving their passports within 10 business days. If you have urgent travel, please go to a passport office.

If your travel is beyond 45 business days, we would ask that you go to one of the 300 Service Canada centres around the country. They can take in your passport. They can't process it on site. The times are similar to what they would be if sent by mail. The reason we encourage people to go in person is that they'll actually see a Service Canada citizen officer who can check and review their application to make sure everything is there. Part of the challenge is that 25% of applications that come in through the mail channel have errors—accidental, but they require additional processing and verification time. This is just one way to make that process simpler.

Again, these offices are fully open and able to process people in a much quicker way.

I have just one other note, and then we'll let you get to your next question. I'll be very quick.

It does take longer to process children's passports than it would a simple renewal for adults, and that's because, as everyone can understand, we want to ensure that both parents are okay with the child getting a passport and with the travel plans. Unfortunately, we do have instances where one parent might take a child, or want to take a child, out of the country without approval, so it is really important that this security check happens.

[Wayne Long, Liberal, Saint John—Rothesay, NB]

Thank you, Minister.

Mr. Chair, I'll share the rest of my time with MP Collins.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

You have one minute.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks.

Very quickly, Mr. Chair, through you to Madam Minister—and Minister, welcome again today—I know that you and your officials are aware that the volume of applications is poised to increase again early next year, as the 10-year passports that Canadians applied for a decade ago are poised to expire leading into the new year.

Could you relay to the committee what plans are in place to address the pending additional volume of passports that will come your way early next year?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Collins.

Actually, this is an important point to clarify. The volume that we're experiencing right now is not a result of the 10-year renewals. Those are starting in early January. Right now it is purely passports that have expired over the last two years or this year, or people who are seeking a passport for the first time—85% of the passport applications that we're getting are first-time passport applications.

I'll turn it over to Lori to talk about our plans for the upcoming surge.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Minister.

The time is over. You may be able to get that in with a follow-up question.

Ms. Chabot, you have the floor.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, Madam Minister.

As my Conservative colleague Ms. Kusie said, our study on passport application processing times follows a ton of complaints from citizens about missed opportunities to get their applications answered. This has been reported in both the print and broadcast media. CBC/Radio-Canada reports that it is chaos. The reason we have chosen to pass this motion is so that you can tell us today what you intend to do to meet the needs of citizens, not to tell them what they should do.

I know that Service Canada officials work very hard, but you're supposed to be able to expect an answer that reflects the reality that you live in. These questions were predictable.

Currently, the 20 Bloc Québécois MPs' offices have 150 files to deal with regarding passports. I too could list several problems like those described above. Earlier, I heard you say that if people had problems, they could just call their MP's office. So here's my first question: do you see MPs' offices as having a supplementary role to that of Service Canada? My answer is no. If your answer is that they just forward those 150 files to you, as they do with EI files, I would say that's the wrong answer.

When you call, there's no one on the other end of the line, and you can't get an appointment. How can this problem be adequately addressed?

I find that a lot of things are blamed on COVID‑19. We expect Service Canada to meet the needs of citizens, and right now it's not going well at all.

How do you intend to address the situation?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

As I mentioned, my office is here for you. We have a telephone line for members of Parliament, precisely to ensure that urgent cases are taken care of. I think all of us as MPs agree that when we have a chance to help someone, we want to do so, as we have done in employment insurance cases. My office has an employee who helps all Bloc Québécois members with employment insurance and passport issues, and we will continue to do so. I know that many of you have worked with my office staff. We don't want to see cases like those reported by Ms. Kusie, so we're going to do everything we can to fix the problem.

Of course, we have...

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

What are the short-term solutions?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Yes, I was getting there.

As I've mentioned several times in the House, we've hired almost 600 people since January, because we anticipated a large volume of applications. We have also changed processes, particularly in the call centres. I will ask my public service colleagues to give you more details on this. It is important to mention that in February we were receiving 50,000 calls per week, whereas today we are receiving more than 200,000 calls per week.

Ms. Power could answer that question.

[Evelyne Power, Director General, In Person and Passport Operations and Strategies, Department of Employment and Social Development]

I'll start by talking about call centres.

First of all, as the minister has indicated, in February we were receiving 50,000 calls a week and in April we were receiving 1.2 million calls a week.

We have been working with Rogers and Shared Services Canada to update the technology so that Canadians have better access to services and do not have to call back multiple times. We understand very well that this can be very frustrating, and this is not the type of service we need to give Canadians. Now, when they call, customers no longer hear a quick dial tone indicating that all lines are busy, but they hear information about the services available in person, at 1 800 O‑CANADA and on the website, as well as information about the availability of agents at call centres.

Currently, the number of calls per week ranges from 450,000 to 500,000, representing a 50% improvement.

In addition, we have added 73 agents to the 150 we had previously, plus those we are hiring to answer calls on the 1 800 O‑CANADA line, which should help spread out the volume of requests. We get a lot of requests for information...

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, but, can we say today that people will be able to make an appointment and talk to someone at the end of the phone?

Also, can we go back to a 30‑day waiting period instead of 50 days?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

As you have heard, the number of passport applications and the volume of calls is very high. We have put in place a number of measures, both in the call centres and in the Service Canada offices. In particular, we have hired more agents to receive people. Despite this, the volume of applications remains very high.

At the moment, people who apply for a passport by mail can take it for granted or be almost assured that they will receive it in nine weeks, while those who apply in person, at a passport office, can expect to receive it in ten days. So it really depends on how they apply.

That said, we are working 24/7 to improve services. The volume of requests is very high and it's not something we can fix overnight. It's going to take time.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

We'll now go to Ms. Zarrillo, for six minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the minister for coming to speak with us today.

I want to speak about the mail-ins and some of the issues that have been coming through my office. Canadians who are waiting definitely feel that there's limited transparency in the process. They have little confidence, because the answers they're getting on the phone are varying, depending on who they call and on which day.

I'm going to talk about one specific case, Minister, because it came to your office this week. It came to me multiple times. My office has been trying to deal with it. There's a family who has been trying to get passports since March and received conflicting information from Service Canada. Finally, the family was told to go to a service centre in Vancouver and pay $145. These are two essential workers who don't have the ability to get away, so this is a problem and a concern.

First of all, can I reach out to your office this week and deal with some of these passport mail-ins that have been in limbo since March, with conflicting answers when our office calls Service Canada?

Also, could you share some transparency for the citizens of Canada about what the process is and what prioritization is? Why have those who mailed in, in March, not seen a passport, some of them, while those who have the ability to get to a service centre seem to be prioritized? Could you provide some transparency around that?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

First of all, Ms. Zarrillo, my office will follow up with yours right now on that specific incident and try to get it solved.

I'll turn to Ms. Power to talk about prioritization and service standards.

[Evelyne Power]

As we've mentioned, because of volume, we are prioritizing clients with travel plans. The in-person services that are provided have up until now been limited. Right now, they're limited to anyone with travel plans identified within 45 business days. That allows us to move those folks as quickly as possible through the process.

The in-person process.... If you recall, the passport process is a paper-based process. It was never intended to be moved to the extent that it is through the mail service. Prior to the pandemic, 80% of our clients came to those in-person sites. We received their applications and processed them on site. We were able to do it successfully in the high nineties, so 97% to 98% of the time. That's not the case right now.

What we've required is in-person prioritizing of those with travel plans. To the extent that we can, in those mail centres, we identify the files where folks have identified travel, and we move those to the front of the queue for processing. We absolutely recognize the challenge that this presents to those Canadians who did the right thing and mailed in those applications in February and March. We're working aggressively across the department to identify the clients who require transfers to our in-person service, so that we can get those passports to them in time for their planned travel.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you for those comments.

Could this committee or even the MPs please get a written summary of that, written information that can be shared with the MPs' offices and with caseworkers around the fact that mail-ins are not desirable at this time, that these are the workarounds and that these are the problems that are going to come up if you don't have access to come to the walk-ins?

Our offices need to have full and good information so that they can direct folks appropriately, so could we get that in writing, please?

[Karina Gould, Liberal, Burlington, ON]

Yes, Ms. Zarrillo, absolutely. In fact, the regional directors for Service Canada sent out correspondence maybe three weeks ago to all MPs' offices across the country with the most up-to-date information, but we can redo that as well. It didn't go to MPs directly. It went to your staff, so they should have that, but we can do that.

Your MPs' offices should have direct relationships with your local Service Canada director. They're very accessible and responsive, and they're very happy to follow up on that.

I would also note that Service Canada updated its website on Thursday evening to provide as much clarity as possible to Canadians seeking a passport.