Public Accounts Committee on March 5th, 2024

[Mark Weber]

The primary strain was dealing with the ArriveCAN app: collecting information that really wasn't for the purposes of Customs and working with an app that went down frequently, was not very user friendly and was not usable by many people who were crossing at the border.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Just to update everyone before I turn to our next line of questioning, I am seeking extra resources so we can hear from our next witness as well. It's not my intention to keep people here into suppertime, but we will go a bit beyond five o'clock just so we give our next witness the adequate respect he deserves for coming in here.

Ms. Sinclair‑Desgagné, you may go ahead for six minutes.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, Mr. Weber. Thank you for coming back.

I'll get right to the questions I've been wanting to ask you for a while now.

Have you read the Auditor General's report, Mr. Weber?

[Mark Weber]

Yes, I've seen it.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Great.

The Auditor General's findings in paragraphs 1.42 and 1.43 raise questions about misconduct on the part of employees at the Canada Border Services Agency, or CBSA.

First, I'd like to hear your views on the code of conduct in place. Does the union have any say in the code or its application?

Second, were you advised of any breaches of the code of conduct?

[Mark Weber]

Regarding specifically what happened around ArriveCAN, we've not been asked or consulted. We didn't have anything to do with procurement. We weren't involved in any of that or had any knowledge of that.

Regarding the CBSA code of conduct, our knowledge of how it works is that it's really lacking in specificity. The CBSA code of conduct is so broad and overarching, and it covers the actions of our members at work and at home. I think a good way to put it is that, really, if they want to get you for something, that covers absolutely everything, which is a real problem with it. We'd like to see it really tightened up and narrowed so that our members know exactly what they should and shouldn't be doing.

The other issue we have in general with how the investigations were done is that we see at the CBSA a very two-tiered system where members—frontline officers—are investigated for almost everything. Largely, the CBSA's management style is to investigate rather than to manage.

On the other hand, if we bring forward serious misconduct of management and upper management, consistently there are no investigations. It's really like screaming into the wind. I bring things forward to the upper management of the CBSA for which, honestly, if our members had done them, I would be advising them there's a good chance they will lose their jobs, but they are simply not investigated.

It's really disheartening. It creates a toxic atmosphere at the workplace when we see what's going on with the ArriveCAN investigations and when we hear the testimony of professional standards investigators. It's hard for our members to see, given what they've experienced in their careers, and it's really hard to know whether the proper things are being investigated as they should.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

That's very interesting.

Precisely on that subject, could you tell me whether you've had discussions on changes that the code needed? I'm talking about changes to add specificity, improve its application and, most importantly, ensure better compliance by employees in some cases?

[Mark Weber]

Yes, we have had discussions around the professional standards policy, how they conduct investigations, the code of conduct itself and the discipline grid the CBSA uses. We have had those consultations with management, and we're not really seeing any change in how those things are done.

Again, how you're treated as a manager and an employee at the CBSA is absolutely night and day. That's the fundamental issue.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you.

What level of management was involved in those discussions?

[Mark Weber]

It's upper management up to the CBSA president.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

I see.

That means the president of the agency would have been informed that the code of conduct wasn't necessarily suitable and, most importantly, lacked so much clarity that employees didn't know what they were supposed to do or how to follow the guidance. In some cases, the guidance merely comes down to common sense, although I'm less partial to that expression these days. As you rightly pointed out, investigations have to be conducted clearly and fairly.

You've seen cases of perceived misconduct and cases where the investigation didn't necessarily focus on the right thing. Is that correct?

[Mark Weber]

Absolutely. We've seen heavy-handed discipline. We've seen investigations where there need not have been any. There could have been a simple conversation with an employee. CBSA, as I said earlier, in general manages through fact findings and through investigation. That has gotten worse and worse over the years despite the fact that we keep adding more and more managers to the workplace. You would think there would be some ability to manage. That's really not what we see there.

My understanding is that discipline is supposed to be corrective and not punitive. We see our members regularly disciplined with no training and really no knowledge of how they could have done anything differently in the first place to not be disciplined. It's quite a challenging atmosphere for them to work in. When they see the behaviour of managers and report that behaviour and see that really nothing happens when it's on that side, it's very disheartening.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Why isn't anything changing, in your view?

I know we don't have a lot of time left, but can you talk more about that?

[Mark Weber]

Change takes time. The union does everything it can to represent members. I think we're successful at representing members in large part. We bring those issues forward to the employer.

I do have hope the new CBSA president, Ms. O'Gorman, is seeing a lot of the things that need to be changed. CBSA is a big ship to turn around. We keep plugging away at it. However, change is needed quite desperately. It has become a more and more difficult place for our members to work in.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

We've actually heard that many former employees left the agency very frustrated.

Are you familiar with Mr. Sabourin's case?

[Mark Weber]

No, I'm not familiar with that.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Luc Sabourin was a CBSA employee. He was a whistle-blower who spoke up about things he'd been asked to do that were completely inappropriate. He reported the situation to management, but it backfired on him. He was bullied and forced to leave the organization.

I'm actually surprised that the union isn't familiar with his case, because it was—

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Your time is up, Ms. Sinclair‑Desgagné.

Mr. Julian, you have the floor for six minutes, please.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Weber, for your incredible patience with us today and at previous meetings of public accounts. You also appeared in front of the public safety committee just a few weeks ago, and we thank you for that appearance on behalf of CBSA officers and public sector employees right across the country, who do fabulous work on our behalf.

You referenced at that time and referenced again in your statement today the massive cuts that were made to CBSA officers across the country in 2014 under the former Conservative government. This is connected, of course, with the rise we've seen in auto thefts, and generally tied to the issue of ArriveCAN is the fact that those positions have not been fully restored.

Can you tell us a bit about the dramatic impact of those Conservative cuts and where the government should have gone in terms of making investments in frontline CBSA officers so that we would have in place functioning systems at the border?

[Mark Weber]

I think the investment has to be in people. We haven't seen those numbers go up. Since 2015, CBSA has added about 2,000 managers to their ranks, which is specifically what we don't need. We're already inundated with managers at CBSA. We have workplaces where we have as many—or in some cases more—managers as we have people doing the work to process travellers and interdict.

I could give examples that are extreme. In North Portal, Saskatchewan, on any weekday, you'll have seven managers and five officers.

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

I'm sorry. Did you say seven managers and five officers?

[Mark Weber]

Yes, there will be seven managers and five officers. I visit workplaces regularly where the numbers are about even. It has become so top-heavy and dysfunctional in some cases.

I can tell you a personal experience. I've worked as an officer in the secondary area at Pearson airport with one other officer, a lineup out the door and four superintendents who do not process any travellers. We see this added—

[Peter Julian, NDP, New Westminster—Burnaby, BC]

What were the superintendents doing?

[Mark Weber]

That's an excellent question.

They were apparently supervising us. I don't want to be mean and say they were doing close to nothing, but it was pretty close to that. A lot of our officers take every acting opportunity they can simply because they're exhausted, and an acting superintendent assignment is a bit of a four-month break for them to not do much of anything. That's the sad reality of it.