Mr. Speaker, the member's question goes to the heart of a number of issues with which we have been struggling for some time. He is absolutely right. I think it is fairly evident that some of the processes that we use to manage in government, not just in human resources but in a variety of areas, become somewhat time worn and in need of modernization.
I keep talking about this as the modernization of public management. It represents trends that are going on around the world. We have seen over the years that some of the ways in which we try to solve problems in public management have fallen out of step with the realities of trying to make decisions. Some of our checks and balances in the systems that we have traditionally used to provide checks and balances have become so onerous that they defeat the purpose for which they were first put in place.
A lot of the discussion that has gone on has been how, in a very large organization such as the Government of Canada, do we create a regime that gives us the oversight capacity that we want but allows us to function in a way that really is in real time.
I will give one very real example. This bill is an outcropping of an earlier suite of legislation, which was Bill C-25 three years ago. The bill concerned the modernization of government. One of the examples was when we wanted to recruit the best and the brightest. We went out into the community and told young Canadians that there were careers for them in the public service. However, once we identified someone, we found that it was taking six months before we could offer the person a job. That is unrealistic in today's world. The kids are scooped up immediately. The government was falling behind in its capacity to recruit.
When we look at some of the things, it is just too easy in a place that is built on the kind of conflict that exists here to ignore the needs of people. It is always easy to cut internally and make the public service bear the burden for some of our problems. Many of us recognized that what we needed was an organization that focused on quality in the public service, the development of our human resource because it is so vitally important to the quality of the work that gets done, and that we should de-chain that a bit from the oversight.
The Public Service Commission came into existence, I believe, in 1917 or 1918, to provide protection against political interference and nepotism in hiring. Its central role was to act as a check and balance to unmanaged political activity.
That is an important role and it is a role that needs to be fulfilled. We have made some changes in the Public Service Commission to strengthen it in that role. However, at the same time we need someone who is paying a lot of attention to a labour force that is big, where people are moving from department to department. The reason the agency came into being was to give you a guarantee, Mr. Speaker, that these things would be managed in a responsible and as positive and proactive a way as possible.
I would invite the member, if he wishes, to meet with me at any time on this. I love talking about it.