Evidence of meeting #140 for Public Accounts in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was clients.
A video is available from Parliament.
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Gen (Ret'd) Walter Natynczyk
But we do know that even now that personal touch, whether it is giving us a phone call or visiting any one of our offices, is still very important to our veterans.
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President, Shared Services Canada
I think that we have absolutely seen that shift you've talked about in society, but I would like to assure the members of the committee that Shared Services, on behalf of the government in supplying technologies and platforms, wants to make sure there are multiple channels that function so that those who want to work online on an app or on an iPad can do that, those who want to pick up the phone can do that and those who want to walk into service centres can do that and have a modern, effective experience. We are definitely looking at all of the different channels that Canadians want to interact with the government on to make sure that there are tools that are modern and allow the departments to be able to function.
Part of the frustration that we're hearing is that the tools were old. They were end of life and they were kind of working with one hand tied behind their backs because we didn't have modern platforms that allowed them to reroute calls to where agents were available to track information. Part of what we have to do is to move more quickly to deploy these technologies but also not to think that it's one-size-fits-all and that we can do all 221 call centres at the same time.
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Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Your time is almost up, and I want Ms. MacLean and Mr. Benay to be able to answer this as well. I think they were trying to get in.
Ms. MacLean.
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Senior Associate Deputy Minister of Employment and Social Development and Chief Operating Officer for Service Canada, Department of Employment and Social Development
We've been focusing very much at Service Canada on the client as the centre of how we change our services. For example, in 2016 we did a study of the service quality for the EI program and realized that as many as 30% of our clients fell into a category we call e-vulnerable because of where they live in the country, literacy, language or other barriers. We continue to offer all our channels and our goal is to make sure the service that people get is excellent in them and allows them to choose how and when they would like to be served.
We're also very aware that the quality and the clarity of the material we have online is a huge driver of people to the telephone and to our in-person centres. We had about nine million in-person visits at Service Canada last year, so we have a real imperative to make our information clear and client oriented.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Other countries have moved to digital-only service delivery. We are not those countries and we appreciate that. I think the Treasury Board policies that we're putting out, if all goes well in June, our new revised policies on services and digital, will take into account the fact that we do not want to leave anyone behind. It is about creating the best service opportunity for every Canadian. We are looking at an omni-channel service approach moving forward, which means multiple service channels. We will be guided by the digital standards that effectively could be service standards as well, so we do have some clear direction on that.
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Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you.
Thank you for that last comment, Mr. Benay.
Mr. Davidson.
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
I'll just finish off my line of questioning.
I just want to let all the witnesses know that I kind of speak for rural Canada, and I always keep in my head that many of my constituents don't have Internet service, believe it or not. People rely on the phone to reach out to the government and it's still very important. There's an infrastructure gap in rural Canada.
Mr. Benay, I'm just wondering if you're familiar with the Auditor General's report on building and implementing the Phoenix pay system.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Yes, I am familiar with it.
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
This is where we're having, I'll say, this technology gap in confidence. You know that an independent review of this information technology project to determine readiness was not complied with as per Treasury Board guidance on independence.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Correct.
So what are we doing?
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
Yes, exactly.
Be quick, please, because I have a couple of other questions.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
We've implemented new policy instruments. For example, in April 2018 we introduced mandatory concept cases for the department so they would engage with Treasury Board Secretariat early so that we could help in the design of technological solutions and also project guidance to ensure that the right governance is in place. There was also a new directive on IT issued four months ago that forces departments to come to an enterprise-wide architecture review board to look at solutions and look at governance. These are all steps that happen before anything goes to Treasury Board for approval. We've really tried to move the engagement needle forward with departments to ensure that we can apply lessons learned from the Phoenix situation as an example
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
All right, because we're really trying to have confidence.
What position did you hold before being appointed chief information officer?
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I was in charge of our national science and technology museums in the capital region, and I spent five years in various positions with Open Text, which is Canada's largest software company, including deploying technology in governments around the world.
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
I always turn to our Auditor General. Are you aware of the Auditor General's report on the national Museum of Science and Technology?
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Yes.
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
I'm going to quote. The Auditor General “found weaknesses in how the Corporation monitored compliance with laws, regulations, and policies, and in how it managed known corporate risks”. Furthermore, “the Corporation had not followed all of its own conservation requirements, putting the integrity of the collection at further risk”. The Auditor General concluded, “The weaknesses that we found in the Corporation’s collection development, conservation, and accessibility amounted to a significant deficiency because the collection of artifacts and materials was the Corporation’s fundamental asset for achieving its mandate”.
I think this is where Canadians are lacking confidence that you are going to achieve your mandate, and we just want reassurance on that.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I'm happy that you bring the point up, and it's a great question. I'm happy to also report that we delivered a brand new science and technology museum under budget and ahead of schedule during that same tenure, and that the government funded a new collection service centre that was not present during that particular audit. That is being delivered as we speak, with artifacts being transferred to that new facility as we speak, so that issue was being addressed.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Not everything is okay—
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Conservative
Scot Davidson Conservative York—Simcoe, ON
We can hope that the call centres will be updated very rapidly, then.
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Chief Information Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
No, I think that has nothing to do with the question on the science and technology museum and efficiency of how we're going to deliver. I'm happy to answer questions on anything that we've done with regard to technology oversight in the last two years, which has been to actively move the needle forward to change our policies.
Our IT policy had not been updated in 14 years. We were able to do that. Our security policy had not been updated in eight years. We were able to finish that. We're now moving towards a digital policy that will continue to augment the oversight and technology delivery.
