Deputy ministers’ report on values and ethics in public service lacks ‘a point of view,’ says expert

Valid critique and yes, the need to be more pragmatic and I would argue, concrete:

….Michael Wernick, a former Clerk of the Privy Council, said that while the document was a “decent consultation ‘what we heard’ report,” it left him asking “what now?”

“It’s oddly lacking a point of view or position or a stance on anything. It kind of just sends the ball back to the Clerk and the Secretary of the Treasury Board and says we really should have policy on acceptable use of social media, but there’s no advice on what that policy should look like,” Wernick said.

“It identifies a problem with the incursions of political staff, but there’s no advice on what to do about it. So it kind of left me hanging.”

The report’s authors said the document is “intended to serve as a prologue to a broader dialogue on values and ethics in the public service, and we begin by sharing what we have heard, frankly and without filters.”

Pierre-Alain Bujold, spokesperson for the Privy Council Office, said the Clerk is taking time to reflect on the report’s observations and recommendations and consider the best options for next steps. He said the report will inform the “next phase,” including how to broaden the discussion on values and ethics.

When Hannaford created the group of senior officials tasked with discussing values and ethics within the public service, he said he expected to see a “milestone report” by the end of the year.

Wernick said he agrees with the report’s call for more engagement, adding that he’d like to see the next round “drill deeper and be more pragmatic.” He added that it will be interesting to see if Parliament shows interest in the report and if the House of Commons committee on government operations invites the Clerk to speak about it.

“This looks like a picture of how the public service sees itself,” he said. “I don’t know exactly who they talked to but it sounds like they talked to a lot of those who were involved in diversity, equity issues. The report is a bit light on things that voters and taxpayers would probably be more interested in like money, productivity, excellence.”

Daniel Quan-Watson, a deputy minister for just under 15 years before his retirement last year, said he supports the report’s recommendation for conversations to be furthered “institution-wide” within federal government departments.

“We need to keep talking about this because things are evolving quickly and in different ways and because people have a lot of questions,” Quan-Watson said, adding that conversations will differ substantially from organization to organization. “I think that this goes a long way to making sure that they do that.”

Quan-Watson said it would have been “deeply problematic” for a tool on all values and ethics in the public service to have been developed or for any major changes to be made to the Values and Ethics Code over a few months.

“That would miss 90 per cent of the public service, I’m not sure that those changes are ones that would be that effective,” Quan-Watson said, adding that he hopes public servants feel free to raise their questions and concerns to managers and senior leadership. “I think the sensible thing to say is listen, here are the areas that we looked at, we’re getting consistent themes in this, so let’s go see what the broader public service has to say about it.”

“That takes time. It makes it stronger and it makes it incredibly more valuable when it’s done.”

Source: Deputy ministers’ report on values and ethics in public service lacks ‘a point of view,’ says expert