Public Accounts Committee on April 15th, 2008

[Leonard Edwards]

The way we're dealing with that is by regularizing people in acting positions. Regarding the process I described to you where we are looking at individuals who have been in acting positions and are confirming them at that grade, again the Public Service Commission has agreed that we can use this rather extraordinary method of doing so. That means the people in those acting positions will be looked at to match the competencies that are required. So if there was ever a question that we had people in acting positions who didn't have the competencies because they were assigned on an acting basis, or in the other cases we discovered they hadn't had the competencies, that will now be confirmed through this process.

I have to say that the work we're doing as a department in this area will take some time. As the Auditor General has pointed out, there are a number of discontinuities, and we are behind in terms of the number of acting staff, and so on. We need to make sure that what we have in place is a good promotion process, that we have a staffing process that includes steps taken by groups....

For instance, all assignments are vetted through a group of managers who look at the issue of competencies: does the individual being suggested for this position have the necessary competencies to fulfill the job, and so on? So we're taking a number of steps.

The other point is, as Michael points out, since the Auditor General's report came out and identified the number of acting positions, we have over the last year reduced those by 30%. I think that's a fairly significant success story and one that we're working on continually.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you.

Ms. Black, you have seven minutes.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you very much. It's nice to see you all again.

My first question is to the Auditor General. It follows up on much of what Mr. Sweet was asking at the end.

On page 15, paragraph 3.56, the Auditor General stated, “We observed a practice of assigning staff to rotational positions regardless of whether their level matched the job requirements, and we found a significant number of people in acting positions for periods such as a whole posting cycle.”

When I look at the response from the department, on page 6 of the department's response, it says that a certain level of acting is normal and desirable. The solution seems to be, in the response from the department, that there could be some seminars or a need for better hiring.

So my question is to the Auditor General. I'm curious about what you think of this response from the department. Will it adequately change the behaviours you've identified in your report?

[Sheila Fraser]

Thank you, Chair.

Our concern, for example, as we note in paragraph 3.58, was that of the 900 Canada-based staff in rotational positions abroad, more than a third were at a level that didn't match the employee's classification level and 100 were actually two levels different. Some were in acting positions for up to four years.

Obviously there will always be a certain number of acting positions in any organization, but this is truly excessive. We think it can be quite detrimental to the success of programs. It raises a lot of questions about a number of processes such as promotion processes. Are the promotion processes adequate? Maybe these people are actually competent and can't get through a promotion process; or if the promotion processes are good, then you have to question why they aren't being conducted. To have that many people acting is not good for any organization.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

I was concerned about the department response.

[Sheila Fraser]

We would like to see more specifics, perhaps. I mean, if the department says there should be a certain number, what is their target number for acting positions and how are they going to deal with the number that exists?

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Would you like to respond to that, Mr. Edwards?

[Leonard Edwards]

Mr. Chair, if I may, as I said in a previous response, we have been able to reduce the number of actings by 30% over the last year. We have gone through an enhanced promotion process. We've put this system in place where all assignments are put through a group of managers who look at the issue of competencies and levels. So if we're not assigning a person to a level, then this board looks at it and says, well, under these circumstances this person does appear to be competent.

I agree with the Auditor General entirely that it is not healthy for an organization to have this much discontinuity.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

My second question deals with the issue of spouses of staff. I heard your comment that no one should be surprised by this in this day and age. I think that's very true. No one should be surprised about it. But I am surprised at how long it's taking the department to identify solutions to this problem. It was first identified, I think, in a royal commission in 1981; that's more than 25 years ago.

I want to ask Mr. Edwards why this is so complicated. Why is it taking so long to make some progress on this issue? It seems to be changing at a snail's pace. If we're going to really attract the best employees in Canada to a field that is exciting--a field that I think a lot of people would aspire to--your department really needs to address this issue in a way that works for families. This is 2008; it's not 1981, when it was first identified.

[Leonard Edwards]

Let me just say on a personal note, Mr. Chairman, that I am a foreign service officer and I've had six postings, and I have a spouse. I have heard this almost every day of my professional career. So personally I'm very much interested in dealing with the issue as best we can.

There are a number of things we can do inside the department and have done inside the department to provide work counselling, to try to find jobs in the local marketplace where people are posted, to give training on how to find a job, to do all sorts of things like this. Fundamentally, even people who aren't in the foreign service would want to go abroad, as we've heard from Treasury Board. Over a third of the people at our missions abroad aren't from my department now; they're from other government departments, and that is a trend that is going to continue. I expect we'll be down to about 50% of the people abroad being from my department over the course of the next four or five years, given the growth of other government departments.

So for these people who don't join the foreign service and expect a certain lifestyle...many foreign service people expect there's going to be some disruption. They join with their eyes open; let's put it that way. But it's increasingly difficult, because two-income families are now the norm. Second careers or two careers are now the norm, and we're going to have to find a way to deal with it. Perhaps it wasn't as pressing as it was in 1981 and, of course, with these other government departments.

So point one is that we're going to do our best within the department. I have certain authorities; we can do certain things. Secondly, we're working with Treasury Board in the review of the FSDs this time around to engage very, very seriously on this, and I'm hoping we will find some ways to go forward.

There is one issue that has been particularly difficult for spouses, and that's the issue of employment insurance, which has stood in the way of their ability to claim employment insurance either while they're preparing for a posting or when they come back and are searching for a job. This is an issue that goes beyond my department and beyond Treasury Board. It goes to the legislation that has to do with our employment insurance system.

So this thing has to be tackled at a number of levels, and it is an enormous--

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

They need a better competitive job environment. The department really has to do a lot better than they've done and make some demonstrated progress on this issue.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Ms. Black. Thank you, Mr. Edwards.

Mr. Holland, for seven minutes.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses.

I want to come back first, if I can, Mr. Edwards, to this issue of the Auditor General finding that in some cases there were no records of oaths of office being taken or security checks for locally engaged staff. Your comment, as I understood it, was that one of the actions you've taken is to remind them that they're supposed to do this.

I want to know what the consequences are, because if an incident occurred where there was a security breach or a major incident had occurred, and you went back and you asked them to show you the security check for the individual who was involved in a leak or some sort of problem, and there was no file, you can imagine that would be a devastating situation. I know that in the financial services sector, where I was, there's a requirement for employees to keep all kinds of detailed information in the files, and if it's not there, they know they're going to be shown the door.

So to me, just reminding them to try to have these things on hand isn't good enough. What's the consequence? This has been identified. Obviously this committee finds it very serious. You have individuals who don't keep these files. What do you do? Hopefully it wouldn't take an auditor's report to uncover this again, but let's say there's another auditor's report and people still aren't doing this. At one point, is there a consequence for this?

[Leonard Edwards]

First of all, as a deputy, I believe the problem has to be fixed. Secondly, I don't think you go around fixing it by threatening to fire people because they haven't filled out these forms, and that sort of stuff. My purpose in sending out instructions is to regularize the situation and to ensure that all future hires are done the same, and that we look back at the records and make sure they are complete where they haven't been complete. I haven't received a report back, so I can't tell you the success rate on this, but that's how I believe we can partly solve the problem.

Now, the fact of the matter is that the occasions of misdoing by locally engaged staff are extremely rare. The ongoing supervision that is given to locally engaged staff by Canada-based employees, particularly if you're working in sensitive areas where you're handling money, the immigration program, the administrative program, consular programs where there might be some fees exchanged and so forth, the supervision is very thorough.

We have had cases of fraud; yes, we have, but they are very rare. I haven't been able to check whether or not they were done by people who hadn't had the security clearance or the reference check, but my guess is that they probably were.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

To pick up on that, you guess that they probably did have those files, but the reality of most of the bad things that happen in this world is that they're rare. What we want to ensure is that we minimize their occurrence and, when they do happen, that everything was done properly. I'm not looking for you to say you're going to go out and fire these people. That's not what I'm asking. I'm asking, what are the consequences?

So you communicate back to the staff, and you expect this information to be conducted, first of all, and then held in file. Then I would expect that there would be a consequence for a first instance of being found not to comply. Then there would be a consequence for not complying a second time or a third time, or however many times you're going to catch them not doing it. But my point is that the organization, as you would see in other organizations where there's an expectation to keep information, would have clearly defined consequences, because that then informs them that you take the matter seriously.

If you simply say, “Hey, try to remember to do that”, then I'm not sure this conveys any degree of seriousness. If you say, “If this isn't done, there will be this consequence; and if you are found to make that mistake a second time, there will be this consequence”, then I think it communicates intent more clearly and I think we, as a committee, would have greater assurance that protective measures are being put in place to ensure this doesn't continue to happen.

[Leonard Edwards]

Do you want a comment on that?

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Yes, please.

[Leonard Edwards]

That's what we are doing.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Okay, maybe you can provide us, either now or at a later date, with what those consequences would be and what--

[Leonard Edwards]

I'll tell you what the consequences are.

Managers have accountabilities up the line. That's the way the system works. They're expected to do certain things. Certainly we take our security responsibilities very seriously. We have a section in the department that is responsible for ensuring that security clearances, both locally and for Canada-based staff, are kept up to date and so on. They will be pursuing this with the managers locally to ensure that these things are kept up to date.

If this is not being done, there will be consequences for the manager in question. Issues around performance will be recorded for future promotion; in the case of EX, it could involve issues of performance and bonus pay, or not, at the end of the year.

These are the ways the public service normally ensures that accountability is carried out. So those are the kinds of consequences that would be brought to bear in this case.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

I guess what I'm getting at--and I don't want to belabour the point, because I do want to quickly go to another one--is that I would prefer some sort of clear communication that states very unequivocally what the expectations are and what the consequences are, and that this has been taken seriously.

In your response, saying it's rare and it doesn't happen that often and we guess that when there is a mistake we do have a file--those things don't give me a lot of assurance. I'd prefer there be something clearer on this, with clearly laid-out consequences. So I'll leave it to you to come back to the committee with that.

The other issue I wanted to quickly touch on was that of language proficiency. I want to talk about a couple of things that were found in the Auditor General's report. One is that only 180 positions are deemed to require a working proficiency in a foreign language.

What surprised me is that only 16% of the people occupying those positions actually met the language requirements. What was even more astounding is that 33% of the people occupying those positions have never even undergone language testing of any kind. Obviously our efficacy in different places of the world is reliant upon our ability to communicate in those languages. Can you tell us what the problem is there, and specifically, concretely, what you're doing to rectify that? This is disturbing to me, and I go back to the comments that my colleague made about the type of multicultural country we're in and the people we are able to draw from.

[Leonard Edwards]

I think part of the problem here is an historical one that has to do with funding for language training particularly. It has tended to be one part of the department that has been easiest to cut whenever we've had budget cuts. So it is starved for resources, first of all.

Second, as I think I explained, we are about to review each of these positions abroad to see to what extent the language requirements are still applicable. We may have been a little ambitious in identifying these language positions. They may not all require that. If you're working in a non-anglophone or non-francophone foreign environment, you usually need to have language facilities. But English or French is often well spoken in most capital cities of the world now, and there's not so much a need for the language as there perhaps was in the past. So updating that list of positions is a good first step, and we want to do that.

Third, I absolutely believe and agree with you that where we have language requirements we must make sure we are providing staff with those language skills. That's absolutely essential. You're dead right that we need to be able to field officers who can deal with those languages. It's important when it comes to critical negotiations in dealing with a consular case, and in promoting a trade mission or accompanying a business on a trade call. So we want to ensure, as part of the transformation agenda I described earlier, that we make some big reinvestments in our language training.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Mr. Holland.

Thank you, Mr. Edwards.

Mr. Williams is next for seven minutes.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Edwards, it's nice to see you again.

Madam Fraser, I would like to thank you for the work you do, because it seems that you kick-start many things to get done. We certainly need to ensure that our foreign public service is working well and up to par. There seem to be some problems there.

I noticed something in your report, Madam Fraser, that I think is worth quoting because it demonstrates the size of the problem. I'm looking at paragraph 3.4 where it says: “The Department is organized into two operational and eight functional branches, as well as two administrative branches, one of which is dedicated to supporting the management of human resources (Human Resources Branch).” And then it goes on to say....

I'm sorry, I lost my train of thought there. Let me start again, Mr. Chairman.

I'm concerned about this “no strategic human resource plan”, Mr. Edwards.

Mr. Small, I understand you're new at the job. Are you going to address this issue right now? I know you're staring to work on the development of the plan. Will that go ahead and get done? What date will it be done by?

[Leonard Edwards]

We have here our human resources plan that was prepared and released subsequent to the Auditor General's report. It's been requested already, and we'll circulate it to you.

When it comes to our Canada-based staff, this human resources plan is up to date. It will need to be renewed and refurbished on an annual basis, and we're going to make sure we do that. I expect that as we get into this a bit more we'll find ways to improve it. It's now one of the key documents for our executive committee in managing the department.

What is really new is the work we have...and it was referred to in an earlier question. We have asked our missions to prepare plans for themselves, on a mission-by-mission basis, that will focus on the locally engaged staff community, because that's where locally engaged staff reside.

Are we asking for them by June?