Human Resources committee  “Maintained operating budgets”...?

Human Resources committee  Thank you. I have some questions for Correctional Service of Canada. I think your report said there are 18,000 staff across the country with the Correctional Service, and you listed off varying levels of what they do: front-line corrections officers, parole officers. Let me stop at corrections officers.

Human Resources committee  My apologies for interrupting. I didn't want to interrupt during the questioning, but some of the questioning is focusing, I think, outside the lines of what the people here today are responsible for reporting to our committee. A week ago, Chair, the people were representing the unions primarily.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship  Madam Speaker, the Prime Minister has made a mess of the immigration system. The number of people crossing our border illegally has reached critical levels, and the Liberals have no plan. The fact is that it is the Prime Minister who has created this mess. Because of what he said, more people are crossing the border every day, and those who are trying to enter Canada in the right and legal way keep getting forced further and further back in the line.

Human Resources committee  On a point of order. We'd have to seek unanimous consent and we haven't done that yet.

Human Resources committee  Before I give that, can I seek clarity about whether we can limit the amount of time for that. Is that correct or is it that, once you give unanimous consent, it's up to the chair to call the meeting?

Human Resources committee  Okay. I give unanimous consent, on the condition that it's four minutes each.

Human Resources committee  Thank you. What I was sharing is very relevant. Bill C-62 appears to be a bill with not public consultation. There was consultation with only one party. It appears to be the billion dollar bill, or the golden handshake bill, or the growing disparity bill, whatever we want to call it, but it's a shocking.

Human Resources committee  Thank you. My colleague Ms. Falk, sitting beside me, asked what the industry standards or averages are, if we compare the public sector and private sector. Do you have any of those statistics available to share with us today?

Human Resources committee  That's fine. The wonderful thing about the Internet is that it provides information. In January of last year, Maclean's magazine had an article called “Public sector workers took a record number of sick days last year”. It noted that we should expect the disparity between public and private sector sick leave to keep growing.

Human Resources committee  Okay, and you're with the department. You're not in a political position, and you're getting direction from the government on where it wants to go. Is that correct?

Human Resources committee  If the government says they want to make a change to keep an election promise, which they have.... The minister himself said today that it was an election promise, and so they've consulted. The people who will be paying for this promise are Canadian taxpayers, including employees of the public sector.

Human Resources committee  I do thank you for your good work, but I just want to clarify this since you are here today.

Human Resources committee  We have laughter from our Liberal colleagues. This is a serious issue when you're spending money out of control. The mandate that the minister received was to “Work with the Minister of Finance and your colleagues to conduct a review of tax expenditures and other spending to reduce poorly targeted and ineffective measures, wasteful spending, and government initiatives that are ineffective or have outlived their purpose.”

Human Resources committee  I'm just going to stop my timer here.