Mr. Speaker, a dissenting opinion on public service renewal is appended to the report by the Standing Committee on Government Operations.
The Liberal majority report indicates the need for public service renewal, particularly since 70 per cent of all public service executives will be eligible for retirement within the next eight years. In 1996, only 1 per cent of staff were under the age of 25, compared to 15 per cent in 1976.
The Liberals could have continued in the same vein and reminded people that, during their mandate, the government has made drastic cuts to the public service in the past three years. It was not smart enough to be concerned with ensuring the transmission of knowledge and the retention of the collective memory within the departments. This unfortunate state of affairs is, in large part, nothing more than the outcome of poor strategic decisions by the Liberals during their mandate, which thankfully is coming to an end.
As for the question of the under-representation of young people within the public service, we again note the incompetency and shortsightedness of successive federal governments, from Pierre Elliott Trudeau's first government right down to that of the present Prime Minister. With the calling of the election only hours away, the Liberals are feeling a sudden need to act.
The young people of the Outaouais region have borne the burden of this, no doubt about it. After three and a half years of Liberal indifference, they now have trouble believing that this same government has taken a sudden interest in them. When the Liberals came to power in October 1993, the unemployment level in the Outaouais for those under the age of 25, was 20.6 per cent; it has now risen to 21.6 per cent. The Liberal report insists on finding excuses for the way the federal government has treated young people in the difficult cuts it has had to make.
According to the government, by 1998-99 the program review will have had the effect of reducing program expenditures, and the size of the federal administration, by 22 per cent. It is, moreover, estimated that, after 1999, the government will save more than $3 billion yearly in salaries. What the Liberal report has forgotten to mention is that, in the meantime, the provinces have been forced, because of the cuts in social transfers, to reduce staff by more than 25 per cent in the areas of health, education and social services.