Evidence of meeting #51 for Official Languages in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was services.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen Service Branch, Service Canada
No. All of the people in our offices are not bilingual. Those in our bilingual offices are.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Yes. When someone has to answer in one of the two languages, we need someone bilingual.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen Service Branch, Service Canada
Yes. The other point...
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Excuse me. That is a bad habit they are getting into.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen Service Branch, Service Canada
Yes, I know. I absolutely agree.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
That is the only point I wanted to raise. Enough said on that issue. I am having trouble understanding why it is like that.
Now, let's move on. You look after one million people per day. You provide this service to one million individuals.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen Service Branch, Service Canada
That is the number of transactions.
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
We handle one million transactions per day. That includes telephone calls, people who come in, cases relating to employment insurance that are dealt with, and so on.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Congratulations, you said that 98% of clients were satisfied with the service.
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
The 98% figure that I mentioned comes from a client survey. Every two years, we conduct a client satisfaction survey. We have just wrapped up the most recent survey, which was conducted in 2010. We have not yet fully analyzed the results, but we have an overall picture of them. We surveyed 6,000 people. That is only 6,000 out of millions of people, but it is nevertheless a good survey. We surveyed 6,000 people who came into our offices, and we asked them if they were satisfied with the service and if they had been served in the language of their choice. Overall, 98% of respondents replied in the affirmative.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Excellent. Those are good results.
You also mentioned a new position. I believe it was Mr. La Salle, or someone else, who mentioned the new official languages coordinator position. Can you explain what this position involves?
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
Yes, thank you.
At the department, we have an organizational and accountability structure to oversee the implementation of the various parts of the Official Languages Act, that is part IV, V and VII and so on. We have coordinators in each region for each part. So there is a coordinator for Part IV, one for Part V, and one for Part VII. Despite an increased number of coordinators, we do sometimes find that coordination is not as good at it should be.
So we want a lead coordinator for each region, someone who is responsible for overseeing the implementation of the Official Languages Act, and not just a small part of it. These coordinators meet on a monthly basis over the phone to consult and discuss issues, and so on. They also meet face-to-face once a year as part of an annual forum that we organize for them.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Mauril Bélanger
Thank you, Mr. Lauzon.
Mr. Murphy, you start the second round.
Liberal
Brian Murphy Liberal Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB
I have a short question. The commissioner's audit dates back to December 2010. At that time, there were Service Canada centres, mobile service sites, and Service Canada call centres. In all, there were 600 points of service. Changes have been made since then. How many points of service do you have now?
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
Thank you.
As you say, we use the expression “points of service”. We do not talk about “offices”, because they are not all offices...
Liberal
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
We have 633 points of service.
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
We currently have 633 points of service.
Liberal
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
We have 194 bilingual points of service.
Chief Operating Officer, Senior Associate Deputy Minister of the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development, Service Canada
That includes 136 Service Canada centres, 50 regular mobile service sites, and 8 community offices. As of April 1, there will be two fewer, in other words 192, because two community offices will be closed.
Liberal
Brian Murphy Liberal Moncton—Riverview—Dieppe, NB
I imagine that the Service Canada centres in Inverness and Port Hawkesbury are both designated unilingual.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Citizen Service Branch, Service Canada
No, Port Hawkesbury est bilingue.