Report calls for a ‘humanized’ public service

2015/12/04 Leave a comment

A good initiative of the previous government:

The report, which recommends implementing the Mental Health Commission’s national psychological standard across government, concludes that the way the public service is managed must shift from an “output-focused environment to one that is more people-focused.”

The recommendations revolve around fixes in key areas: leadership, engagement, education on mental health, training and workplace practices, communication, and promotion and accountability.

“We must humanize the workplace … A more people-focused environment contributes to a high-quality federal public service (and) compassion is fundamental to this shift,” said the report.

Treasury Board President Scott Brison said the report shows the government and unions have “common ground” where they can work together.

“Humanizing is consistent with our government agenda to create a culture of respect for the public service,” said Brison.

“Mental health is part of that, ensuring public servants have a healthy workplace,” he said. “It is the right thing and healthy workplaces are more productive.”

The task force grew out of the bargaining demand PSAC tabled nearly a year ago. It asked the government to adopt the Mental Health Commission’s national psychological standard across government and enshrine it in all collective agreements.

Clement took the extraordinary step of taking the proposal off the table, and setting up a task force to examine the standard and identify the toxic factors in the workplace that are making workers sick.

“The unions deserve credit … and I give full marks to Tony Clement for having helped to initiate this,” said Brison. “I told the unions that it this is just the beginning.”

Brison stressed the committee’s work won’t be used as a bargaining chip in “any way, shape or form” when Treasury Board negotiators and the 18 unions resume collective bargaining on sick leave in January.

The cost of mental illness, from absenteeism to productivity, has been on the government’s radar for the past decade, with mental health claims accounting for 47 per cent of all disability claims.

The 2014 public service survey found employees’ engagement was falling and one in five said they were harassed, mostly by co-workers or bosses.  Studies of executives and their health showed similar trends.

Last year, 40 per cent of all calls to the hotline for the Employee Assistance Program were about mental health.

Source: Report calls for a ‘humanized’ public service | Ottawa Citizen

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Restoration of the Court Challenges Program

2015/12/03 Leave a comment

Another one of the mandate letter commitments of interest, noted by Jeff Sallot writing on the challenges the Liberal government has in reversing the previous government’s approach to the courts (it used to be administered by the Human Rights program at Canadian Heritage, part of the then Multiculturalism and Human Rights Directorate when I was there):

Trudeau’s mandate letter to Wilson-Raybould suggests that shameful foot-dragging by government lawyers will no longer be part of the federal government’s litigation strategy.

The minister’s mandate goes even further. She’s been told to work with Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly on restoring a “modern Court Challenges Program.” The last version of this program was killed by the Harper government in 2006. It provided financial assistance to people and groups who had what looked like legitimate beefs with the government involving equality rights.

Program officials were independent and worked at arms’-length from the government. They looked for cases that raised important questions about rights and public policies so that the courts could render judgment and provide guidance on how the Charter should be interpreted in similar circumstances down the road.

Many of the earliest rights cases, including gender equality cases, might never have made it through the courts without the financial assistance of the Court Challenges Program. And we would all be the poorer for it.

How Harper tied the courts in knots — and what Trudeau should do about it

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Clinton e-mails reveal Canadian foreign service enmity towards Harper Tories – The Globe and Mail

2015/12/03 2 Comments

Not unique to the newly-renamed Global Affairs but nevertheless particularly striking and reinforces the Conservative government’s suspicion of public servants, particularly the foreign affairs and aid public servants.

And this strikes me as disloyalty to the former government, not in keeping with the public service ‘loyal implementation’ obligation:

The U.S. special co-ordinator for Haiti said Canadians were worried about budget cuts that would have slashed down an operation from 11 employees to four, for a country that was ostensibly a major Canadian foreign policy priority.

“I was a little astonished at how openly the career folks at the foreign and assistance ministries disliked their new political masters and wanted us to convince them not to cut Haiti,” said Tom Adams, in a May 2012 e-mail forwarded to Clinton and released Monday.

“In my many years here I have never seen such open disloyalty with a change of administrations. Although the political appointees told me there was no need to have the Secretary talk to Baird about Haiti, the senior career folks, on the margins, implored me to have this done.”

The dynamic described in that e-mail was on public display recently after the federal election, when employees at the foreign ministry cheered during a visit from their new Liberal bosses.

Clinton replied that she was happy to call her counterpart John Baird, if necessary. The presidential contender’s e-mails are now being released in instalments, after an uproar over her use of a private home-based server that couldn’t be searched for freedom of information requests.

Source: Clinton e-mails reveal Canadian foreign service enmity towards Harper Tories – The Globe and Mail

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New code of conduct introduced for political aides: Kathryn May

2015/12/02 Leave a comment

Good synopsis of the new code:

With the new code, ministerial staff must act with integrity and honesty, support the minister’s duties, be diligent and loyal to the minister, and work with the public service to support the minister.  When working with bureaucrats, they must:

  • be aware of the ethical standards, guidelines and codes of conduct that public servants must comply with;
  • stay out of departmental operations, including how money should be spent;
  • not engage public servants in activity that breaches their ethical and legal obligations as non-partisan public servants;
  • not direct or issue orders to public servants;
  • not undermine or circumvent the authority of deputy ministers; and
  • not suppress or alter advice that public servants prepare for ministers.

The code also calls for a separation between ministers’ social media accounts and those of the government. That’s long been the policy but the Conservatives were repeatedly called out for using the government’s communications machinery to promote partisan interests.

They made public servants refer to the Government of Canada as the Harper Government on all news releases and backgrounders.

In another case, departments were asked to send retweets promoting a family-tax measure not yet passed by Parliament, including a hashtag with the Conservative slogan #StrongFamilies. Employment Minister Pierre Poilievre had public servants work overtime to create promotional videos about child benefits, which featured him.

The government has two types of social media accounts – departmental and thematic accounts — which are targeted at specific topics or audiences. They are used to promote or advertise federal programs but can’t have identifying “party symbols” or partisan content.

The code allows ministers and parliamentary secretaries to have their own social media accounts, but won’t allow government resources to manage or create content for them.

Departments can’t tweet, retweet or link to the personal or political accounts of ministers. Ministers, however, can link or tweet content from Government of Canada websites.

Source: New code of conduct introduced for political aides | Ottawa Citizen

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Liberals say overhaul of patronage appointments to include gender-parity goal

2015/12/01 Leave a comment

No surprise – was clearly implied in the common language in the mandate letters.

The first test, of course, will be the appointment this week (I expect) of parliamentary secretaries:

The federal Liberals say they plan to extend a promise of gender parity in cabinet to ensure the same outcome in the hundreds of appointments the government makes to boards, agencies and Crown corporations.

Just how the process will work is unclear: The Liberals vowed in the election to overhaul an appointment process that now is conducted behind closed doors and was sometimes mired in accusations of political patronage for government donors or failed candidates.

The party has vowed to create an outside body to recommend new senators, a model similar to one used in Britain for government-wide appointments to boards and agencies made by cabinet and ministers.

The Liberals didn’t provide details of how the appointments process, which they now oversee, will work.

“Appointments will be open, transparent and merit-based and we will ensure gender parity and that more indigenous peoples and minority groups are reflected in positions of leadership,” said Olivier Duchesneau, deputy director of communications to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“This will apply government-wide to everything from the cabinet to the Supreme Court to boards of Crown corporations.”

Duchesneau said the opaque nature of the appointment process has fuelled cynicism about backroom politics.

Source: Liberals say overhaul of patronage appointments to include gender-parity goal | CTV News

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Liberal transparency reforms subject to ‘review’ next year

2015/12/01 Leave a comment

Not surprising, these kinds of changes take time to develop and require considerable consultation and preparation.

In the meantime, however, it would be nice if public servants could take a cue from the government’s signal change and implement a less restrictive redaction policy (it was funny for me to have my ATIP requests on documents that I had worked on overly redacted):

Delivery of a key Liberal promise on transparency is likely months away, as an election commitment to reform the Access to Information Act has morphed into a “review” of the legislation starting next year.

During the election campaign, Leader Justin Trudeau said a Liberal government would end fees for processing information requests; give the information commissioner the power to order release of documents; and make ministers’ offices subject to the act, among other changes.

But Trudeau’s mandate letter to the minister responsible for shepherding the reform, Treasury Board President Scott Brison, backs off from those categorical commitments, most of which the Liberals have been touting since at least June 2014.

Firearms RCMP

The office of Suzanne Legault, information commissioner of Canada, says it is not aware of any immediate changes to the access-to-information system since the Liberals came to power. (Sean Kilpatrick/Canadian Press)

The promise to cut fees disappears altogether from the mandate letter. It says other promises are to be part of a “review” that will include input from Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault and other stakeholders.

And the platform commitment to ensure the act “applies” to ministers’ offices, including the Prime Minister’s Office, has changed in the mandate letter to “appropriately applies.”

A spokesperson for Brison’s office says details of the “review” will be announced in the new year, and will include an examination of fees.

“Given the importance of these changes and their complexity, further consideration is required,” said Lisa Murphy. “The government will take the time necessary to fully examine all the options.”

Source: Liberal transparency reforms subject to ‘review’ next year – Politics – CBC News

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A change in government alone won’t fix the malaise: Savoie

2015/11/30 Leave a comment

Always interesting to read Savoie’s observations.

A good list of fundamental questions facing the public service:

A change in government in itself will not address the malaise confronting the public service. It can, however, open a window to answering fundamental questions about organizing government.

If nothing belongs to a single department any more, should we still rely on traditional line departments to come up with policy proposals and deliver public services? Should government have self-governing delivery arms tied to policy centres led by ministers? If government departments and agencies cannot retain revenues or their budget, how can we expect them to remain frugal? How can we streamline accountability requirements? How can we isolate, at least some government operations, so that missteps become lessons learned for managers rather than “gotcha” fodder for the blame game? How can we improve relations between ministers and the public service, government and Parliament?

Dealing with fundamental questions will force senior government officials to go beyond giving the appearance of change while standing still. The question needs the attention of at least some senior ministers and some senior public servants operating away from the demands of the day. Past reform attempts have sadly ignored Parliament, which may offer some explanations for their failure.

Why not structure a House of Commons committee and ask that it pursue these questions?

Public servants should be encouraging this debate. They should, however, shy away from partisanship, even the appearance of partisanship. The one thing that gives the public service strength, credibility and standing with Canadians and, yes, with politicians, is its non-partisan status and the ability to serve all politicians without fear or favour.

I would add to the list greater awareness and mindfulness of public servant biases and values, rather than just focusing on more avert partisanship, to improve the impartiality and neutrality of advice.

Source: A change in government alone won’t fix the malaise – The Globe and Mail

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Public servants ‘gaming the system’ — take twice as many sick days as private sector workers: report

2015/11/28 Leave a comment

While the data is correct, the interpretation that most people ‘game the system’ is more anecdotal than evidence-based (some clearly do of course).

While I support changes that reduce such abuse, I would want to preserve provisions for sick day banking in cases of catastrophic illness (e.g., cancer):

And the article is silent on Canada’s public servants take up to twice the number of sick days a year as private sector workers do, because of different motivations, work cultures and rules that encourage “gaming the system,” says a new report by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

Phillip Cross, Statistics Canada’s former chief economic analyst, concludes in the report that the existing sick-leave regime in the federal government should be overhauled because attitudes and cultural practices “rather than biology and medicine” are at the root of the problem.

Cross, who made his name as a straight-shooting analyst, said a “sickness in the system” accounts for why public servants claim 10.5 days a year for illness while private sector employees average 6.4 days. The overall public sector – including education and health care workers – is close to the federal average at 10.6 days a year.

He said differences between the sectors are so significant that working in the public sector itself is a determinant of sick-leave use, rather than exposure to illness or injury.

‘I don’t want to sound like private sector workers are saints and public sector are sinners’

“I don’t want to sound like private sector workers are saints and public sector are sinners. If they had the same opportunity to game the system, I think it is human nature to take advantage of it, and the opportunities for gaming are much easier in the federal government,” said Cross.

“The rules allow people who want to work as little as possible to succeed. Is it the system or the individual? It’s a bit of both.”

The study was based on data from Statistics Canada’s labour force survey, which includes all full-time employees other than the self-employed. The survey’s finding of federal employees taking 10.5 days a year is in line with the 10.3 days that a Parliamentary Budget Office report found several years ago.

Cross’s study found the gap between the private and public sectors has also been widening. Public servants took an average of 7.2 days off in 1987 – including federal employees – compared to 10.6 days today. Most of that increase came after 1995. At the same time, private sector employees take 6.4 days, the same as they did 27 years ago.

Source: Public servants ‘gaming the system’ — take twice as many sick days as private sector workers: report

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Liberals will find key to undoing Harper’s agenda in his infamous ‘firewall’ letter | Ottawa Citizen

2015/11/23 Leave a comment

A good in-depth and must read piece by Andrew Potter on how the ‘firewall’ letter was implemented from Ottawa, and the tactics behind implementation of the ideology:

Data: It wasn’t privacy, as Tony Clement said, or freedom, as Max Bernier argued, that was the real rationale for killing the mandatory long-form census. It was to throw a whole lot of noise into the demographic signal that the census had been giving for decades. That is also why Statistics Canada as a whole was gutted over the course of the Harper years. Without accurate data, social planners are flying blind.

Expertise: No government in living memory has been as hostile to experts and to evidence as the Harper government. But as Laval economist Stephen Gordon recently argued, it wasn’t all forms of expertise and evidence that gave the Tories hives – plenty of their economic initiatives were rooted in the best available evidence. What the Tories were allergic to was expertise that steered the evidence in directions they didn’t want to go – “committing sociology,” in Harper’s wonderful turn of phrase. That is why scientists were muzzled, policy shops were shuttered and bureaucrats were ignored.

Money: Here is the meat in the sandwich. When it comes to social planning, the ultimate source of Ottawa’s power is the spending power. And this is where Harper had his greatest success. By the end of his tenure as prime minister, Ottawa’s spending, as a share of GDP, had fallen to levels not seen since the middle of the 20th century. And the spending that does remain is overwhelmingly devoted to either just keeping the lights on or takes the form of transfers to the provinces and individuals.

Harper’s policy genius here was the two-point cut in the GST, which currently costs the federal treasury about $12 billion a year. Harper’s political genius was the creation of an all-party and pan-Canadian consensus around the virtues of a balanced budget at that historically low-level of federal spending.

No data, no experts and no money. Starve the beast, but make it blind and deaf at the same time. This is Harper’s “Ottawa Firewall” in a nutshell.

‘Flat-tire federalism’

As long as Harper was in power, this firewall against centralized social planning was bound to be highly effective. The question is, what remains of this agenda with a Liberal majority in power in Ottawa?

The long-form mandatory census is back, just under the wire. Another missed census in 2016 would have gummed up the data for generations, but as it stands, it looks like the 2011 asterisk will remain just that.

The scientists have already been unmuzzled. The public servants have been asked for their advice. The policy shops are staffing up and stocking the shelves and will be open for business soon.

But what about the money? This is where things get tricky for the Liberals. Their commitment to running three relatively small deficits to build infrastructure and kick-start growth caught everyone in the chattering classes off guard, and turned out to be a political winner.

But the promise was to return to balance by the last year of their mandate. That is, they accepted the basic premise of balanced budgets at more or less current levels of federal revenues (their tax plan calls for additional revenues of just $3 billion). This isn’t nearly enough, and there is not enough economic good weather in the offing for Ottawa to grow its way to good times.

An Ottawa with lots of data and lots of policy ambitions but no money is going to be pretty ineffectual.  At some point, the Liberals are going to have to tackle the revenue problem. Without money, without the fiscal capacity to get things done, all the data and expertise and policy advice is just squiggles on a page and vibrations of air molecules.

A federal government that is nicer, less controlling, more transparent but still broke is not one that has much capacity to bother the provinces with socialist schemes. And if that’s where things remain, then Harper’s long-term victory will be cemented, regardless of who is in power.

Source: Liberals will find key to undoing Harper’s agenda in his infamous ‘firewall’ letter | Ottawa Citizen

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Trudeau’s Liberals more in line with Canadians’ fundamental values: Ekos Poll

2015/11/21 Leave a comment

Not surprising, as most polling during the election showed Conservative over-reach was off-side general Canadian values:

Graves said his polling found that after 10 years in power, Stephen Harper’s Conservatives were facing “growing tension” between what they stood for and the basic values espoused by Canadians.

“I really believe that the election shifted from being an important election about the economy to a historic election about values.”

His conclusion is supported by another poll EKOS conducted Oct. 8-12. Canadians were asked to identify the “most important factor” that would determine their vote.

Forty-seven per cent said it would be the choice that best reflects their values; 33 per cent said it would be a party platform or ideas; 10 per cent said it would be the party leader; and eight per cent said it would be the local candidate.

Canadians were asked about the “choices” that best describe their “vision” of Canada. Sixty four per cent cited humanitarianism and development versus 23 per cent who opted for defence.

Sixty-three per cent favoured active federal government, while 23 per cent supported “minimal government.”

And 57 per cent favoured “reason and evidence” over the 24 per cent who stood by “moral certainty.”

“I think people got fed up,” Graves said of voters.

“They were really resentful to not only this indifference, but hostility, to science and to reason. It was a very strident anti-intellectualism and it didn’t fit well. It’s not where Canadians were.”

Source: Trudeau’s Liberals more in line with Canadians’ fundamental values: Poll | Ottawa Citizen

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