Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie.
I hope that the House will have the patience to indulge me for one short moment. This past week in my riding, I was honoured to spend a few moments at two stops of the Wounded Warrior Run in B.C. These folks ran all the way from Port Hardy to Victoria to talk about the challenges that so many veterans and first responders face. They are fundraising to make sure that they can provide immediate support. I deeply appreciate their dedication, their vigorousness in the run, and their commitment to the people who rush in when others are rushing out. I just want to take a moment to express my appreciation for them.
Today, we are talking about something that is really a fundamental issue. It is about paying employees on time. It is about making sure that employees get the pay they deserve for the work they do. The most important thing we must do in this debate today is recognize that our public service workers are still doing their work every day, and this is a tremendous testament to their dedication to this country. They are still showing up, often not knowing whether they are going to get paid, and whether they are going to be paid less or overpaid. I just cannot say enough about all those people. I thank them for continuing their amazing work even in this very precarious environment.
I am hearing a lot of partisanship in this place today, and we need to let go of that. We need to let go of blame. We need to get moving on action.
The reality is that people in this country are refusing position changes, promotions, or parental leave because they are afraid they will not get paid. Think about that, Mr. Speaker. There are people in this country who are making decisions on whether or not to have children. People are afraid they will not get paid if there is any change to their employment.
This system was put in place because it was meant to save $70 million a year. Now we are over $400 million in trying to fix it, and 73% of federal employees are struggling under this issue. That is close to 200,000 workers in this country. At the end of the 2017 audit period, 49,000 employees were still waiting to have pay requests processed, after having waited more than a year.
The reality on the ground is that often there is no compensation for shift work. Overtime is being recorded or paid improperly. Income tax is being calculated incorrectly. Delays are happening in pension payments. Employees are getting overpaid, underpaid, or not paid at all.
I remember one constituent telling me about working in the same position for over 20 years and suddenly that full-time job is being paid as a part-time job. This person keeps showing up and hoping that this will get fixed.
The result is incredible stress for workers and their families. We cannot leave that out of this conversation. Families are in incredibly precarious positions because they are not getting their compensation.
I am thankful that we are having this important discussion today. I want to talk about some people in my riding. This is so important, because it is a human issue. People in this country are struggling.
I want to talk about my constituent Graham. He worked with DFO for over 32 years and retired in 2016. He was expecting to be paid his severance pay, and he has been asking for it since 2016. He was told it was being processed. He called again in early 2017 and was told that he was supposed to fill out a form that he had never heard of before, and he had to fill it out online. Graham is not really comfortable working online and was very distressed that nobody had even spoken to him about this form. He finally figured it out and on May 4, 2017, with the help of a local financial adviser, he submitted the form. It is now February 2018, and Graham is told that it is still being processed. This is somebody who dedicated 32 years of his life to this job and to this country, and he is now being told that he still has to wait.
Then there is David, who worked for DFO from 2001 to 2016. David received a pay increase in 2014, but it never appeared on his pay. Now he is owed for the two-year period and still has not received that. He has called numerous times since leaving in 2016, and he has always been told that his file is being processed. He just called again last week and was advised that no one has been assigned to his file yet, nor has anyone looked at it. He is to call back in the next few weeks for yet another update.
The reality is that this is causing him and his family significant emotional and mental stress. It is important to recognize that people who are trying to do their job are being forced to not only do their job, but try to fight for their pay. I am pretty sure that this is not what they are supposed to be doing and they should not be asked to do that. David just wants to see this resolved and move on. There is over two years of money owed to him for that pay increase.
Then we have Scott, who worked for DFO for 36 years. When I started here, we knew that the Coast Guard station in Comox was going to be shut down. We fought hard not to have that happen, but unfortunately it did. After all those years of service, Scott was asked to go to Victoria and help change it over. He did all that work, and then he went back to Comox. He is now working for the Department of National Defence.
It is important to know that Scott is still being paid as an employee of DFO. That has not been fixed yet. He also earned a small pay increase, and that is still not being given to him. Recently, Scott went online to track his case and noted 26 outstanding items needing to be processed under his employee number. This is two years of dealing with this pay system. He gets zero earnings sometimes, and other times he gets huge lump payments. His child tax benefit has been hugely impacted by this, because he was overpaid and then underpaid. This is incredibly stressful for his family.
Then there is Stacey, who has a mortgage. She is a single mom supporting her family and doing the best she can. She is now two annual increment payments behind. That was a large part of how she was going to pay the mortgage, and she still has not received it. Again, she is going back and forth between the HR team and the pay centre, and being told to go back again. She is trying to find time in her busy work schedule, where she is dedicated to working for the people of this country, and she does not have time for calling, fighting this fight, and filling out numerous forms. She lives off debt, as she does not have the money to support her family because the government has not fixed this.
These are the realities on the ground. I want to make sure that people in my riding of North Island—Powell River know what our party is asking for today, which is this:
That, in the opinion of the House, the government committed a gross error in judgement when it operationalized the previous Conservative government’s Phoenix pay system over the clear objections of both the affected unions and departmental staff, and that the House call on the government to: (a) pay all employees correctly and on time, every time, for the work they do; (b) exempt those who have been overpaid by Phoenix from having to pay back the ‘gross’ amount, despite actually receiving a substantially lower ‘net’ amount; (c) compensate those in the public service who have experienced damages from Phoenix, both financial and otherwise; and (d) publicly apologize to all of those who have endured hardship as a result of the government's error.
This is a reasonable request. This is a request that honours the realities on the ground of families that have lost so much. I have had constituents tell me stories about having to borrow a tremendous amount of money just to meet their basic needs. Constituents have had to eat at friends' houses, and communities are coming together to support these people, but it is completely unacceptable that they are being asked to do this.
Many business owners have said that if they ever did this, they would be charged and held accountable. How is it that there are two sets of rules for small businesses and for the government?
We ask the government to do the right thing, honour the people who work for us every day, make sure they are paid, and fix this fiasco.