Definitely worth a look, for the richness of the data as well the insights into the government’s diversity and inclusion priorities and how it stitches the narrative together with political and Canadian public priorities.
Intro has the key messages:
“Early Learning and Child Care, which is supporting better economic outcomes for women, by making it possible for more women to participate in the workforce, while securing access to quality child care and learning, thus contributing to positive childhood development and the future well-being of children.
The interim Canada Dental Benefit has helped hundreds of thousands of children get the oral health care they need, and once fully implemented in 2025, the new Canadian Dental Care Plan will improve the long-term health of 9 million Canadians, who may have previously been unable to visit an oral health professional due to the cost.
The National Action Plan to End Gender-Based Violence provides targeted action to protect Canadians who experience or are at risk of experiencing violence because of their sex, gender, gender identity, gender expression, or perceived gender.
The Federal 2SLGBTQI+ Action Plan advances the rights and equality for Two-Spirit, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, and other sexually and gender diverse people in Canada.
The Implementation of the National Action Plan to End the Tragedy of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls is providing targeted, culturally-appropriate supports to Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people, while working to address the root causes of the violence they face.
In Budget 2024, the government is making investments to close the divide between generations. For younger Canadians, the government is taking new action to reduce tax advantages that benefit the wealthy, is investing to build more homes, faster, is strengthening Canada’s social safety net, and is boosting productivity and innovation to grow an economy with better-paying opportunities.
These efforts will improve the lives of all younger Canadians, and their impacts will be greatest for lower-income and marginalized younger Canadians, who will benefit from new pathways to unlock a fair chance at building a good middle class life.
This starts with a focus on housing. Resolving Canada’s housing crisis is critical for every generation and the most vulnerable Canadians. The government is building more community housing to make rent more affordable for lower-income Canadians, including through:
The $618.2 million Federal Community Housing Initiative;
The $15 billion Affordable Housing Fund, including a $1 billion top-up in Budget 2024;
The $1.5 billion Co-Operative Housing Development Program; and,
The $4.4 billion Housing Accelerator Fund, including a $400 million top-up in
These investments provide Canadians and younger generations with opportunity ––finding an affordable home to buy or rent; having access to recreational spaces, amenities, and schools to raise families.
Having a place to call home creates a broad range of benefits. When survivors of domestic partner violence can find affordable housing, this creates a safe home base for their children to break cycles of violence and poverty. When Indigenous people can find affordable housing that meets their specific needs that means they can access culturalsupports to help heal from the legacy of colonialism. When persons with disabilities are able to find low-barrier or barrier-free housing, this enables them to utilize the entirety of their homes.
To ensure that young people and future generations benefit from continued actions for sustained and equitable prosperity for all, this budget makes key investments to guarantee access to safe and affordable housing, help Canadians have a good quality of life while dealing with rising costs, and provide economic stability through good-paying jobs and opportunities for upskilling.”
Interestingly, no mention of the employment equity task force and its recommendations, although it is mentioned in the Budget.
Immigration aspects are limited to “continued funding for immigration and refugee legal aid” (but the Budget has significant funding for immigration and reflects the government’s pivot away from unlimited temporary workers and international students and post 2015 ending annual increases).
The Budget also has a reference to “Permit the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) to disclose financial intelligence to provincial and territorial civil forfeiture offices to support efforts to seize property linked to unlawful activity; and, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada to strengthen the integrity of Canada’s citizenship process (with little to no detail).”
No surprise, but the 2019 and 2021 election platform commitments to eliminate citizenship fees remain unmet.
The Government’s proposed reduction in the public service by 5,000 public servants over four years (1,250 per year) is meaningless as the 2022-22 EE report shows annual separations more than 10 times that:
One thought that crossed my mind while browsing this close to 40 page document is whether this level of detail and effort would survive a change in government. Unlikely IMO, given the pressure to reduce spending and the CPC general aversion to excessive employment equity reporting and measures.
The latest report, with a range of additional information compared to previous reports: EX1-5 level breakdowns, more longer-term data sets, summary salary distribution, seven-year hiring, promotion and separation datasets, top five/bottom five occupational group etc. Overwhelming amount of data than needed for more general audiences but wonderful for nerds like myself.
In addition, TBS has implemented, on a provisory basis pending the revision to the EE Act, in this report separate equity group for Black public servants, as recommended by the EE Task Force. However, likely reflecting data issues, it has not done so for LGBTQ as also recommended by the Task Force, giving the impression of being a secondary priority and likely reflecting greater advocacy (Black Class Action class action etc).
Needless to say, representation by EX level will likely provoke the most interest.
Figure 1 provides the overview numbers, with relatively small variations between the equity groups, with the expected pattern of greater representation at the EX-1 level with the exception of visible minorities at the EX4 level which match the general EX4 population.:
Figure 2 highlights the 2023-2020 comparison between junior and medium level EX (directors and DGs) and senior EX (ADMs), and the percentage increase during this period. The steep increase can likely be interpreted in part to the public service’s overall diversity efforts and the Clerk’s Action call:
Figure 3 compares all employees, all visible minorities, not Black employees, Black employees only and their respective distribution among EX categories, taking advantage of the new section on Black employees. To address the “less than 5” issue, I have collapsed the EX4 and EX5.
Only at the junior EX-01 level, do all three groups exceed the overall distribution. Non-Black visible minorities are more strongly represented than Black employees at all levels save for the EX-01 level, relatively minor but not insignificant.
By including this separate analysis of Black public servants, the report only highlights the limitations of such a carve-out.
My previous analyses of the past 6 years of disaggregated data highlighted the importance of comparisons among all visible minority groups with respect to Black public servants, given than their representation, hiring, promotion and separations are stronger than a number of other groups (How well is the government meeting its diversity targets? An intersectionality analysis). By being selective, this presents the situation of Black public servants as being worse than such comparative data demonstrates. I will be updating this hiring, promotion and separation analysis but do not expect the trend to differ.
On a general level, I was struck by the rapid year-over-year growth of the public service, from 236,133 to 253,411, or 7.3 percent.
Hardly sustainable and should the Conservatives win, as appears likely, the cuts will be deep and painful for the public service. Given that employment equity is unlikely to be a priority for such a government, this may be one of the last extensive and comprehensive reports (they were particularly lean during the Harper years). Should the Liberal government not pass new EE legislation during its mandate, unlikely that a Conservative government would given general ideological aversion, financial pressures and higher priorities.
Yet another pressure (and DEI in general has discounted Jews and antisemitism). That being said, recognizing Jews as a separate category would also require recognizing other religions, further muddying the waters between gender, racialized minorities and religious minorities, making intersectionality analysis likely beyond the capacity of the public service.
Analysis would be stronger if there was some data presented in terms of discrimination and harassment reported cases (sorry, “reported” without references or actual data doesn’t cut it):
In 2022, the Jewish Public Service Network (JPSN) petitioned the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force to designate Jewish public servants as an “employment equity ginvroup” in response to the blatant antisemitism, anti-Jewish hatred, and oppression that have become endemic within Canada’s public service.
However, only months before Hamas’ savage attacks against the state of Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force rejected the JPSN’s request and stated that, despite the rampant antisemitism that Jewish public servants have been forced to endure, the Task Force does not “recommend the creation of a separate category for some or all religious minorities at this time.”
Unfortunately, although the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force has refused to designate Jewish public servants as an “employment equity group,” it is readily apparent that Jewish people throughout Canada’s public service are consistently the victims of overt antisemitism, explicit oppression, and anti-Jewish hatred.
For example, data shows that antisemitic incidents have become increasingly frequent and are consistently permitted to transpire throughout Canada’s public service, particularly in the wake of Hamas’ recent attacks against the state of Israel. Even the Task Force itself was forced to acknowledge in its final report that it was “especially concerned by the reported rise in anti-Semitism [in Canadian society and Canada’s public service].” In fact, whenever the Israel-Palestine conflict erupts, antisemitic incidents and violent antisemitism inevitablyskyrocket.
In addition, antisemitic canards about Jews and money are routinely invoked, and countless macabre antisemitic delusions about the Jewish community have been allowed to migrate freely throughout Canada’s public service. For instance, when one Jewish public servant dared to eat matzah at work, she was immediately beset by a colleague who asked, “How could you eat that given it is made from the blood of Egyptian children?”
Sadly, it is clear that the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force has struggled profoundly to accurately locate the Jewish experience within the public service, and has completely failed to earnestly interface with the intersectionality that is inherent to every Jewish identity, ideology, and experience.
For example, the word “antisemitism” only appears twice throughout the Task Force’s entire final report. Furthermore, the words “Jew,” “Jewish,” and “antisemitism” do not appear at all within the report’s executive summary. In contrast, the Black community and the 2SLGBTQI+ community are referred to more than 300 times and 175 times, respectively.
In addition, the Task Force has remained particularly unable to reconcile the fact that it is impossible to classify the Jewish identity as merely “race” or “religion.” As the JPSN itself was forced to reiterate: “Jews are often described as a ‘religious minority’… [However,] the Jewish people are an ethno-religion. Both the ethno and the ‘religion’ are important.”
Unfortunately, the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force’s utter inability to earnestly interface with the challenges that are innate to Jewish identity and to empathize with the plight of Jewish people is not a unique phenomenon.
Rather, Canadian society and the international community have long remained doggedly committed to the myth that the Jewish community is a rich, white, homogenous mass.
Moreover, throughout the advent and onset of “identity politics,” the Jewish nation’s alleged “whiteness” and purported ideological uniformity have consistently been used as the impetus for countless antisemitic tropes, as well as blatant antisemitic abuse and violence.
In fact, countless political actors and organizations deny the plight of Jewish people around the world and dismiss the constant surge of anti-Jewish violence and antisemitism throughout the international political system, simply because the Jewish community does not satisfy the requisite “diversity criteria.”
Therefore, although Jewish identity is certainly the product of centuries of vigorous tradition and customs, it has become essential for all Jewish people and every Jewish ally to expose and embrace anew the vibrant diversity that is inherent to the Jewish community and its fundamental ethos.
Canadian society and the myriad structures that comprise its political apparatus, such as the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force, must first accept the premise that every Jew is an individual and that Jews are real people, replete with problems, social needs, and ills aplenty, before any Jew will truly be treated as a human being in Canada.
William Barclay is a political theorist and consultant who has collaborated with political actors and organizations throughout North America and Europe in order to inform policy and help successfully resolve various unique political challenges.
Fair enough but would have thought higher priorities, particularly given overall representation number of Black public servants compared to other visible minority groups:
….In October 2022, the federal government called for a Federal Court judge to dismiss the uncertified class action seeking $2.5 billion in compensation, arguing workers should pursue other avenues for redress, including filing complaints with the Canadian Human Rights Commission.
Amnesty Canada applied to the court to intervene last summer, with the organization’s counsel noting in a cross-examination a few months later that its participation would be “limited to making legal arguments regarding the defendant’s obligations under international law.”
“Canada’s duty to uphold federal workers’ rights goes beyond the Charter and domestic employment equity legislation,” Ketty Nivyabandi, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada’s English-speaking section, said in a news release about the decision. “As we will stress to the court, Canada also has clear obligations under international law to promote equity, counter racism and provide an effective remedy when people are subjected to systemic discrimination.”
The court decision stated that the government was the only opponent to the motion, “largely on the basis that the proposed submissions are substantive in nature and not relevant to the procedural issues raised in the certification motion and motion to strike, and on the basis that, in any event, these issues are not governed by international law.”
In a news release, the Black Class Action Secretariat said it welcomed the court’s decision to allow Amnesty International Canada’s intervention in the lawsuit despite the government’s efforts to “vehemently oppose it.”
“This pivotal ruling underscores the necessity of incorporating international human rights perspectives in the fight against systemic discrimination within the federal public service,” a BCAS statement read. “This intervention highlights the national and international importance of our cause and the urgent need to address these injustices.”
The certification hearing is expected to take place after May 3, but BCAS said it called on the government to consent to the certification of the class action instead of “forcing workers to relive decades of trauma.”
“This step is crucial in moving forward toward a fair and just resolution for the affected Black workers,” its statement read. “We urge the government to commit to meaningful actions that address and rectify the discrimination within the public service, thereby restoring trust and integrity in Canada’s federal public service.”
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.”
….“The obvious question from a citizen taxpayer point of view is, ‘We have 40 per cent more people in government, am I getting 40 per cent faster service?’ I don’t think most people feel that value for money,” said Aaron Wudrick, director of domestic policy with the independent non-partisan Macdonald-Laurier Institute think tank in Ottawa.
“It seems to me you either want to retain that expertise outside or inside government and yet they seem to be spending more in both areas.”
He added: “There are obviously choices this government has to make” with higher interest rates and after years of deficits. “They’ve started to make some signals they will have a bit of fiscal retrenchment. We haven’t seen that play out in terms of hard numbers. I think the budget will be a big signal as to whether they’ll actually change direction or continue on this path.”
Donald Savoie, Canada Research Chair in public administration and governance at the University of Moncton, said he was troubled by the fact that overall employment in the National Capital Region of Ottawa-Gatineau has continued to creep up as a share of total PSC-tracked employment, to 47.6 per cent. It was less than 30 per cent four decades ago, and is closer to 20 per cent now in the capital regions of other countries, including the United States, Britain, France and Australia.
“I think that’s something Canadians should be concerned about because the points of service and program delivery happen at the community, regional and provincial level,” he said. With the dwindled share of federal employment outside Ottawa “it’s not a surprise the quality of service delivery will go down.”…
The federal government will work to prevent artificial intelligence from discriminating against people applying for jobs in federal government departments, says Treasury Board President Anita Anand.
In a wide-ranging year-end interview with CBC News, Anand acknowledged concerns about the use of AI tools in hiring.
“There is no question that at all times, a person’s privacy needs to be respected in accordance with privacy laws, and that our hiring practices must be non-discriminatory and must be embedded with a sense of equality,” Anand said when asked about the government’s use of AI in its hiring process.
“Certainly, as a racialized woman, I feel this very deeply … We need to ensure that any use of AI in the workplace … has to be compliant with existing law and has to be able to stand the moral test of being non-discriminatory….
As always, the general diagnostique is easier than concrete implementation, a common failing of these high level commentaries:
The non-partisan Public Service of Canada is an essential national institution, responsible for delivering government services to Canadians and providing policy advice to the government. It has played an outsized role in helping build this country.
But these days it seems to be constantly under the spotlight in the media and in Parliament, as a steady stream of intelligence leaks, contracting fiascos, procurement bottlenecks, workplace harassment incidents and service delivery snafus grab public attention.
This drip-drip of shortcomings is not good for public trust in a vital national institution, nor is it good for morale among public servants themselves.
We can do better. A high-performing public service is what taxpayers deserve and the country needs, and no one wants this more than today’s public servants. They are as troubled by these shortcomings as anyone else. But they are equally aware that they work in an institution burdened with serious impediments to nimble decision-making, innovative ideas, clarity on priorities and meaningful accountability. Indeed, responding to recent problems with yet more rules and regulations rather than solutions would only exacerbate things. So, what can be done?
What is needed is not a years-long Royal Commission but rather a common-sense approach to fixing how government operates. Here are six key problem areas, solutions to which would yield a more engaged public service and improve services to Canadians.
• The starting point is realizing that government has become too complex to manage effectively. Today, the federal government is composed of 22 regular departments and more than 80 departmental agencies and corporations. This is in addition to 34 Crown corporations, the RCMP and the military.
No private sector firm, no matter how large, would ever set up such a byzantine organizational structure and expect to operate efficiently. The proliferation of entities makes alignment and cohesion of programs across government difficult, creates overlap and duplication, and increases administrative overhead costs.
• Second, and related, the public service is too large to operate effectively. Today it numbers almost 360,000 employees — an increase of 95,000, or 36 per cent, over the last decade. But why?
The Canadian population has expanded by 14 per cent over the same period and the Canadian economy grew just shy of 20 per cent, suggesting public sector productivity has deteriorated. A smaller public service, with less duplication of functions and leaner management structures, would be more efficient and less costly.
• Third, oversight is too diffuse to be effective. Responsibility for oversight spans the Treasury Board, the Privy Council Office, the Public Service Commission, the Auditor General, departmental audit and evaluation committees, and a host of parliamentary agents as well as Parliament itself.
These oversight bodies attempt to enforce a bewildering morass of rules, regulations and red tape that stifle healthy risk-taking but perversely create incentives to work around the rules, as we have seen recently in procurement. Fewer and clearer rules, and clarity about who is responsible for oversight, makes a lot of operational sense.
• Fourth, accountability is too opaque. No organization functions well with fuzzy accountabilities. Clear accountability is not just about who is responsible when things go wrong, but also about who is responsible for making sure they go right.
The accountability problem is exacerbated today by the increasing involvement of political staff in both controlling advice to ministers and implementing policy decisions. Restoring clarity on the respective roles of PMO, political staff and public servants is essential to a responsible, accountable and high-functioning public service.
• Fifth, scant attention is paid to measuring or managing public sector productivity. Rather, governments typically report on inputs and activities, not outcomes and results. The broken procurement system is a logical place to start a focus on productivity and results, after the horror shows of the Phoenix pay system, innumerable military procurement failures and the incomparable contracting fiasco around the CBSA ArriveCAN app.
Another productivity destroyer is long lists of policy priorities set out in mandate letters, with public servants expected to deliver on all of them. Yet the sheer number and lack of prioritization means lots of activity but few priorities actually delivered.
• The sixth is a hesitant management culture. The public service needs to rethink the required skills for working effectively in a 21st-century, data-driven and uber-connected economy and society. Like the private sector, government should be bulking up on data scientists, AI experts, IT specialists and project managers rather than relying on consultants.
High-performing organizations deal promptly with ineffective managers, because they hurt productivity and morale, and with bad apples who undermine the credibility and culture of institutions. More proactive management would yield better service delivery to the public and better morale and engagement by public servants.
Thoughtful people inside and outside government have been writing about these concerns for some time. Now is the time to do something, and that will take leadership and courage. The best way to deal with these issues is not to talk endlessly about them, but to act, to take the tough decisions that will make the public service a more productive organization, geared for success in the 21st century.
It’s only common sense.
Kevin Lynch was the Clerk of the Privy Council and is former Vice Chair of BMO. Jim Mitchell is an Adjunct Professor at Carleton University and a former Assistant Secretary to the Cabinet in the Privy Council Office.
Wernick: The pay-as-you-go proposal on cutting federal spending not as simple as advocates say
Michael continues to provide interesting commentary based up his experience in government:
There are two interpretations of what pay-go legislation could mean in Canada. One is that the proponents know it is just for show – a form of fiscal virtue signalling – and they have no intention of applying it with any rigour. The future would be full of exemptions, waivers and extensions. It makes the base happy and looks like decisiveness. But it isn’t serious.
The other possibility is that it is serious and would at regular intervals create a hot mess for future governments and for future fiscal choices. It isn’t going to deliver more effective government to let an algorithm stack the deck, distort the options, create unnecessary and artificial crises, and stealthily erode those parts of government that don’t have political and media champions.
So, which is it – empty virtue signalling or a hot mess of fiscal distortion? We can do better, either way.
Any political party that wants to take real action on restraining spending should do it in a serious way: Let Canadians know before the election what it considers cuttable and what it considers a priority. Once in office set up a deliberative process. The 1990s program review would be my starting point for designing the next one.
What is essential and what is discretionary in government spending is a political judgment informed by ideologies and values – a judgment that must be responsive over time to new facts and realities.
There are many better ways for democratically elected politicians to approach spending restraint and to achieve it. Pay-go legislation isn’t a good one and should be discarded before the platforms for the next election are written – after which it will be difficult to turn back.
Buruma: Geert Wilders may have shock value, but he harbours an ‘outsider’ rage we’ve seen before
Of note:
Mr. Wilders may not be a fascist, but his obsession with sovereignty, national belonging, and cultural and religious purity has a long lineage among outsiders. Ultra-nationalists often emerge from the periphery – Napoleon from Corsica, Joseph Stalin from Georgia, Hitler from Austria. Those who long to be insiders frequently become implacable enemies of people who are farther away from the centre than they are.
Kurl: Pierre Poilievre needs to choose his words much more carefully
Yes, the risks are there:
The last six weeks have brought out the worst in us. Bomb threats and shootings at Jewish schools. Calls for doxxing, censure and harassment of students and faculty who sympathize with Palestinians and ceasefire calls. In Toronto alone, police are reporting 17 incidents of Islamophobic or anti-Palestinian hate crimes since Oct. 7 (compared to just one in the same period in 2022). Antisemitic hate crimes numbered 38 (last year it was 13 in the same period) and now comprise half of all hate crimes reported to Toronto police since Oct. 7.
At such a fraught time, leadership from Poilievre would see his words about these highly sensitive issues focused on appealing to Canadians’ better natures, not further driving them into suspicion and division.
But will the opposition leader and his strategists do this? We are not so far removed from the failed Conservative campaign of 2015, notorious for its “barbaric cultural practices” tip line. The director of that disastrous campaign is reportedly tipped to direct the upcoming one.
Poilievre and the Conservatives for now, anyway, have the support of a plurality of Canadians. They need to start acting like it means something to them.
Shachi Kurl is President of the Angus Reid Institute, a national, not-for-profit, non-partisan public opinion research foundation.
May: Chief information officer Catherine Luelo resigns from job revamping federal tech
Doesn’t bode well:
Private sector executives, unfamiliar with the culture and complexity of operations, have historically had rough time making the adjustment, said Michael Wernick, a former clerk of the privy council and now the Jarislowsky chair of public sector management at the University of Ottawa.
He said the government has never resolved how technology should be managed. Is it a single service with common standards, interoperability and cybersecurity? Or is it a loose federation of 300 departments and agencies where deputy heads and managers have autonomy? It now operates with both philosophies, depending on the agency.
With the Conservatives leading the polls, it is worth speculating what changes a Conservative government might bring to immigration, citizenship, multiculturalism, and employment equity policies, and the degree to which Tories would be constrained in their policy and program ambitions. Despite talking about change and “common sense,” they will still be constrained by provincial responsibilities and interests, the needs and lobbying of the business community, and an overall limitation of not wanting to appear to be anti-immigration.
Constraints
One fundamental political constraint is that elections are won and lost in ridings with large numbers of visible minorities and immigrants, like in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area, British Columbia’s Lower Mainland, and other urban areas as shown in Figure 1. Arguably, the Conservatives learned this lesson in the 2015 election, where citizenship revocation provisions and the Barbaric Cultural Practices Act signalled to many new Canadians they were not welcome.
The demographic of immigrants and minorities across Canadian electoral ridings. Graph courtesy of Andrew Griffith
Given that immigration is a shared jurisdiction with the provinces, any move to restrict the numbers of permanent residents, temporary workers, and foreign students will likely be met with provincial opposition. All provinces—save Quebec—largely buy into the “more is merrier” demographic arguments. Provincial governments and education institutions rely on large numbers of international students to fund higher education, and thus have already signalled concerns with the current government’s trial balloon about capping students from abroad.
Stakeholder pressures are a further constraint. Business groups, large and small, want a larger population to address labour market needs, and that includes international students for low-value-added service jobs. A larger population also means more consumers. Immigration lawyers and consultants, both in Canada and abroad, benefit from more clients. Settlement and refugee groups can continue to press for increased resources even if evaluations question their effectiveness with respect to economic immigrants. Most academics focus on barriers to immigrants and visible minorities rather than questioning their assumptions. Lobby groups like the Century Initiative and others continue to push the narrative that a larger population is needed to address an aging population, a narrative that is supported by all these stakeholders, and federal and provincial governments (except for Quebec).
Few of these stakeholders seriously address the impact of immigration on housing availability and affordability, health care, and infrastructure, despite all the recent attention to the links between housing and immigration. Most stakeholders are either in denial, claim that ramping up housing can be done quickly as many recent op-eds indicate, or argue that raising these issues is inherently xenophobic if not racist.
Global trends that also could shape a possible Conservative government include increased refugee and economic migrant flows, greater global competition for the same highly skilled talent pool and, over time, expanded use of AI and automation as a growing component of the labour market.
Immigration
Given these constraints and the fear of being labelled xenophobic, Conservatives have focused more on service delivery failures than questioning immigration levels, whether it’s permanent resident targets or the rapid increase in uncapped temporary workers and international students. Poilievre has stated that the Conservative focus will be on the “needs of private-sector employers, the degree to which charities plan to support refugees, and the desire for family reunification,” suggesting greater priority on economic and family immigration categories, as was largely the case for the Harper government. The Conservatives’ recent policy convention was largely silent on immigration. They are engaging in considerable outreach to visible minority and immigrant communities, adopting the approach of former Conservative minister Jason Kenney, “the minister for curry in a hurry.”
That being said, it is likely that a Conservative government would likely freeze or decrease slightly the number of permanent residents rather than continuing with the planned increases (the Liberal government recently indicated that it is not “ruling out changes to its ambitious immigration targets.)”
Figure two highlights the growth in permanent and temporary residents since 2015. The extent of public debate on the impact of immigration on housing provides latitude for a freeze at 2023 levels, or a small decrease given that immigrants and non-immigrants alike are affected. Graph courtesy of Andrew Griffith
It is less clear whether a Conservative government would have the courage to impose caps on temporary workers given pressure from employers, including small businesses. However, the previous Conservative government did have the political courage to impose restrictions following considerable abuse of the temporary work program, ironically exposed by the Liberals and NDP. Similarly, imposing caps on international students would run into strong resistance from provincial governments given their dependence on students from abroad to support higher education. Even placing caps on public colleges that subcontract to private colleges—which are more for low-skilled employment than education—would be challenging given employer interest in lower-wage employees. They may, however, reverse the Liberal government’s elimination of working-hour caps for foreign students.
Whether a Conservative government would go beyond the usual federal-provincial-territorial process and provide financial support for foreign credential recognition, or be more ambitious and transfer immigrant selection of public sector regulated professions (e.g., health care) to the provinces is unclear. However, given that regulatory bodies are provincial and, for health care, provinces set the budgets, they may explore this option.
While the simplification and streamlining of over 100 immigration pathways is long overdue, given the complexity for applicants to navigate the system, and for governments to manage and automate it, such longer-term “fixing the plumbing” initiatives are less politically rewarding than addressing various stakeholder pressures.
Given the increased number of asylum claimants, a Conservative government would be likely to restore requirements for claimants to have sufficient funds and an intent to leave, and may consider reimposing a visa requirement on Mexican nationals.
Citizenship is arguably the end point of the immigration journey as it represents full integration into society with all the political rights and responsibilities that entails. This assumption is being challenged by a combination of Canadian economic opportunities being relatively less attractive for source countries such as China and India, along with greater mobility of highly educated and skilled immigrants. As a result, the naturalization rate is declining as shown in figure three.
Figure three depicting naturalization rates between 1996 and 2021. Graph courtesy of Andrew Griffith
The previous Conservative government was more active on citizenship than other recent governments. In 2009, it released a new citizenship study guide, Discover Canada, with a greater focus on history, values and the military. It also required a higher passing score on the citizenship test—up to 75 per cent compared to 60 per cent—and different versions were circulated to reduce cheating. Language requirements were administered more strongly, and adult fees were increased from $100 to $530. A first generation cut-off for transmission of citizenship was implemented as part of addressing “lost Canadians” due to earlier Citizenship Act gaps. C-24 amended the Citizenship Act to increase residency requirements from three to four years, increased testing and language assessment to 18-64 years from 18-54 years, and a revocation provision for citizens convicted of treason or terror.
It is unclear the degree to which the Conservatives will consider citizenship a priority in relation to other immigration-related issues. From an administrative perspective, changing residency requirements again would simply complicate program management, make it harder to reduce processing times, and would not provide any substantive benefit. Re-opening citizenship revocation would simply draw attention to the risks that countries would offload their responsibilities, as the example of former U.K. citizen and Canadian citizen by descent Jack Letts illustrates.
Given that the Liberal government to date has not issued a revised citizenship guide, the Conservatives would likely stick with Discover Canada, issued in 2009. Similar, the existing citizenship test and pass rates, and proof of meeting language requirements would not need to be changed. As the Liberal government never implemented 2019 and 2021 campaign commitments to eliminate citizenship fees, one should not expect any change from the fee increase of 2014.
The Conservatives may wish to revisit the issue of birth tourism. In 2012, they pushed hard, but ultimately the small numbers known at the time and provincial opposition to operational and cost considerations made them drop their proposal. Since then, however, health-care data indicated pre-pandemic numbers of birth tourists to be around 2,000, although these dropped dramatically during the pandemic given visa and travel restrictions.
In contrast to immigration and citizenship, a Conservative government would face fewer constraints with respect to multiculturalism and employment equity. Their public criticism of wokeism, their policy resolutions stressing merit over “personal immutable characteristics“, their criticism of diversity, equity and inclusion training, and their criticism of Liberal government judicial, Governor in Council, and Senate appointments all point to a likely shift in substance and tone.
It is highly likely that resources would be cut sharply under a Conservative government given their overall approach to government expenditures, their general approach to limit government intervention and their scepticism regarding critical race theory, systemic racism, and diversity, equity, and inclusion training. There would likely also be a return to a more general integration focus between and among all groups. They would, of course, be unlikely to curb any of the recognition months or days, given the importance to communities (and their political outreach).
A Conservative government might reduce the amount and quality of data available regarding visible minority, Indigenous Peoples, persons with disabilities represented in public service, and other government appointments.
The Liberal government expanded public service data to include disaggregated data by sub-group, allowing for more detailed understanding and analysis of differences within each of the employment equity groups since 2017, along with data on LGBTQ+ people. Previous government reports only covered the overall categories of women, visible minorities, Indigenous Peoples and persons with disabilities. It is uncertain whether these reports under a future Conservative government would revert back to only reporting on overall group representation, hirings, promotions and separations. Given that this concerns public service management, it may well decide to continue current practice or the more sceptical elements may press for change.
On the other hand, political appointments—judges, Governor-in-Council, Senate—are another matter. Appointment processes are likely to be revised given concerns that the processes introduced by the Liberal government unduly favoured candidates more on the centre-left than centre-right. Figure 4 highlights the increased representation of women, visible minorities and Indigenous Peoples in political appointments.
Figure four highlights the increased representation of women, visible minorities and Indigenous Peoples in political appointments. Graph courtesy of Andrew Griffith
Similarly, at the end of the last Conservative government, Governor-in-Council appointments to commissions, boards, Crown corporations, agencies, and tribunals were 34.2 per cent women, 6.1 per cent visible minorities, and 2.9 per cent Indigenous. Under the Liberal government, the number of women increased to 51.4 per cent, visible minorities to 11.6 per cent, and 4.2 per cent Indigenous by January 2023.
Senate appointments present a more nuanced picture. Conservative appointment of visible minorities was at 15.8 per cent, representing a conscious effort to address under-represented groups, but women, at 31.6 per cent of appointments, and Indigenous Peoples at 1.8 per cent, were significantly under-represented. The Liberal introduction of a formally independent and non-partisan advisory board resulted in a sharp increase in diversity: 58.8 per cent women, 20.6 per cent visible minorities, and 16.2 per cent Indigenous Peoples.
Along with these process changes, the Liberal government expanded annual reporting to include visible minorities, Indigenous Peoples, persons with disabilities, and judicial appointment reporting also included LGBTQ and ethnic/cultural groups. Should a Conservative government decide to stop these annual breakdowns, it will be harder to track any shifts in representation.
The current review of the Employment Equity Act, launched in 2021, has not yet resulted in any public report on consultations and recommendations from the Task Force. Given limited parliamentary time and higher priorities during the current mandate, it is unlikely that any revisions to the Act will be approved. However, should any legislation come to pass, it is likely that a future Conservative government might wish to revisit some of the provisions.
Concluding observations
To date, two overarching themes have driven Conservative discourse: Canada is broken, and the need to “remove the gatekeepers.” The Yeates report confirms that the immigration department is broken, reflecting long neglect of organization weaknesses, a lack of client focus, and, I would argue, an excessive multiplicity of programs that make it harder for clients to navigate, and more difficult for IRCC to manage.
One of the ironies of assessing likely Conservative policies is immigration, citizenship, and related areas all pertain to government being “gatekeepers.” It’s easier to shrink the gate for some policies and programs than others (e.g., government political appointments). Others, such as reducing levels of permanent and temporary residents, are much more challenging given the strength of provincial, business, and other stakeholders opposition. The degree to which a Conservative government is prepared to expend political capital will obviously reflect whether or not it has a majority in Parliament.
The sharp decrease in public support for immigration, given the impact on housing, health care, and infrastructure, likely provides greater flexibility for any future Conservative government. While there is greater flexibility with respect to multiculturalism and employment equity, a Conservative government could also be ambitious with needed immigration reforms for permanent and temporary immigration.
While some have argued that immigration and related issues have become a third rail in Canadian politics, this need not be the case. The concerns being raised are regarding the impact of large and increasing numbers of permanent and temporary migration on housing, health care, and infrastructure, not the racial, religious or ethnic composition of immigrants. These issues affect immigrants and non-immigrants alike and focus on commonalities, not differences.
Multicultural Meanderings 