HUMA Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Thursday, March 14, 2002

Á

1105

The Chair (Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby--Ajax, Lib.))

Ms. Bennett

Á

1110

The Chair

Ms. Guay

The Chair

Ms. Bennett

The Chair

Mr. Paul Burkholder (Director General, Strategy, Policy and Planning Directorate, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency)

Á

1115

The Chair

Mr. George Da Pont (Assistant Deputy Minister, Human Resources Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans)

Á

1120

Á

1125

The Chair

Á

1130

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Ms. Bennett

The Chair

Ms. Bennett

The Chair

Ms. Bennett

Ms. Guay

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP)

Ms. Bennett

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Á

1135

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Johnston

Mr. George Da Pont

Á

1140

The Chair

Ms. St-Jacques

Mr. George Da Pont

Ms. St-Jacques

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Ms. Guay

Á

1145

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Guay

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Guay

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Á

1150

The Chair

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Mr. McGuire

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Joe McGuire

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Joe McGuire

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Joe McGuire

Mr. George Da Pont

Á

1155

Mr. Joe McGuire

Mr. George Da Pont

Mr. Joe McGuire

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

Â

1200

Mr. George Da Pont

Ms. Libby Davies

Mr. George Da Pont

Ms. Libby Davies

Mr. George Da Pont

Â

1205

Ms. Libby Davies

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Elaine Courtney (Director of Employment Equity Programs, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency)

Ms. Libby Davies

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

The Chair

Mr. Gurbax Malhi (Bramalea--Gore--Malton--Springdale, Lib.)

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Â

1210

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. George Da Pont

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. George Da Pont

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. George Da Pont

Â

1215

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Mr. Johnston

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Â

1220

Mr. Johnston

The Chair

Ms. Folco

Mr. George Da Pont

Â

1225

Ms. Raymonde Folco

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Folco

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Ms. Guay

Mr. George Da Pont

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Â

1230

Ms. Guay

Mr. George Da Pont

Ms. Guay

Mr. George Da Pont

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Elaine Courtney

Ms. Guay

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

Â

1235

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

Mr. Paul Burkholder

Ms. Libby Davies

Ms. Christine Coffey (Director, Resourcing and Career Management Division, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency)

Ms. Libby Davies

Ms. Christine Coffey

Â

1240

Ms. Libby Davies

Ms. Christine Coffey

Ms. Elaine Courtney

Mr. George Da Pont

The Chair

Mr. Paul Burkholder

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

Â

1245

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

The Chair

Ms. Libby Davies

The Chair

Ms. Guay

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

Â

1250

The Chair

Mr. Johnston

The Chair

---

CANADA

Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

---

NUMBER 054

l

1st SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

---

EVIDENCE

Thursday, March 14, 2002

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Á  (1105)  

[English]

    The Chair (Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby--Ajax, Lib.)): Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 54th meeting of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities.

    This morning we have a two-part agenda. First we will have a brief consideration of the report of the Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities. Dr. Bennett, chair of the subcommittee, is with us.

    Dr. Bennett, would you please give us a run-through of your committee's report.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.): As most of you know, the Subcommittee on Persons with Disabilities has been seized by the problem with the disability tax credit, as I think most members of Parliament have been over the fall.

    Long before the review audit of the disability tax credit began, we had been receiving interventions from citizens about the problems with the disability tax credit, particularly in view of its inability to deal with mental illness. There were some cases that had gone to tax court. There were some serious problems, mainly with the new form and the language on it about thinking, perceiving, and remembering.

    There were enough cases to make people feel that doctors were not able to understand the form. Even if they thought a person deserved the credit, sometimes doctors had to say that the person did not qualify. We had some basic problems with the form, in that it wasn't actually ascertaining the intent of the tax credit.

    While we were considering the work plan for the fall, all of a sudden the revenue agency sent out 106,000 letters to Canadians telling them that there was not enough information in their file for them to qualify again for the disability tax credit and they would have to reapply. These were people who had had benefits.

    We then found that some of the people who'd been told they didn't enough information in their file did indeed have enough information; they were in fact blind, with a CNIB number, and I think they found the tone of this letter quite insulting. It didn't quite sound as if it was saying “We think you've been ripping off the government for all of these years”, but there was a tone in it that said “You don't qualify. Apply again and we'll see if you do.”

    The committee had heard enough by December. We had a press conference to say that we hoped the government and the agency would rethink this ongoing assessment and that they should actually write a letter to the people who'd received the letter to apologize for its tone and to explain why this audit was being done, which really wasn't explained in the first letter at all. It had sounded like they'd been singled out to be reassessed because their claim was fraudulent. We didn't receive a response to this letter. This week we have. We then proceeded with our hearings.

    This is what the report is about. It takes in both things. We think it's a really stupid form--and almost every witness has said it's a stupid form. It doesn't actually explain.... We think this audit process is flawed. But mainly you will see from our recommendations that we think that.... Time and time again, it's been recommended that there needs to be some process by which to do this that includes physicians and disability groups. I think you'll see that it's a pretty hard-hitting report.

    We think the status quo is unacceptable. We think we need a new form before anyone is asked to reapply or requalify. A unanimous report from all members of a committee is Parliament at its best. I think Monique will explain that there's actually an additional commendation from the Bloc Québécois.

Á  (1110)  

    The Chair: Yes, the chair recognizes Madame Monique Guay.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Thank you Carolyn.

    Madam Chair, when we will have a quorum, the Bloc Québécois will submit a complementary opinion, and not a dissenting opinion like we see so often, in both official languages no less, to give the report even more weight. The opinion will raise the importance of that. It will further emphasize that the diagnosis is accurate. The opinion will state:

    

...the measures presented show that the committee has decided to support the most vulnerable persons, so that the fight for equity and social justice can finally lead to measures that address these persons' needs.

    Madam Chair, with the committee's approval, we will submit this opinion when the committee will have a quorum. Thank you.

[English]

    The Chair: Are there any other comments or questions from members of the committee?

    Okay, seeing none, Carolyn, I'd like to thank you and your committee for the work you've done. I know this has been a labour of love, and in the best sense of the word: trying to assist those who are having difficulty with the form.

    At the first opportunity, I will put it before committee for adoption so that it can be tabled in the House. It is my hope we may do this before the House rises for the two-week break.

    Again I thank you for your work; please pass it on. We'll deal with it at the first opportunity.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: If there are any questions from any of the members--or anybody who's worried about anything, if it's not able to be done today--they should know that all of us on the committee really are of like mind on this, and if anybody has any questions, all of us are prepared to answer the whys and wherefores.

    The Chair: You've always made yourself most available. Thank you.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: Thank you.

    The Chair: We will now move to the second portion of our meeting. Today we have with us in our study and pursuit of the order of reference on employment equity some folks from the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency.

    Mr. Burkholder, I think you've brought some others, whom you can introduce in a moment.

    Also, we have Mr. Da Pont and Yves Dupuis from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

    We're going to start with CCRA. Mr. Burkholder, you have about five or six minutes to make your initial presentation, because we want to leave time for questions after.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder (Director General, Strategy, Policy and Planning Directorate, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency): Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

    I'd like to introduce my colleagues. Elaine Courtney is director of employment equity programs and Christine Coffey is our director of resourcing and career management at the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency. I am the director general of human resources strategy policy and planning with responsibility for employment equity programs.

    Thank you again, Madam Chair and members of the committee, for inviting us here today. I am pleased to be given this opportunity to speak to you about employment equity within the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency from the perspective of an operational organization, and in closing to also offer a few observations related to the Employment Equity Act.

    The Canada Customs and Revenue Agency is a large public service organization of some 47,000 employees at 750 service sites in all parts of Canada providing direct services and programs to Canadians under its mandate to collect revenue, administer tax laws, provide border services, administer international trade and travel legislation, and deliver specific social and economic benefits to Canadians.

    As you may be aware, the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency became a separate employer in November 1999. As such, we remain subject to the Employment Equity Act under paragraph 4(1)(c). As a separate employer, we have seized the opportunity within the flexibilities of our overall human resources management framework to build a strategic approach to employment equity that suits our particular business needs and that further advances our employment equity initiatives.

    Let me offer a few examples. As a separate employer, and in accordance with the Employment Equity Act, we now produce our own agency-focused annual equity report that is tabled in Parliament by the President of the Treasury Board. In fact, we anticipate the tabling of our 2000-2001 employment equity report very soon.

    Additionally, we now undertake our own workforce analysis independent of the Treasury Board Secretariat, using the comprehensive and recognized national occupational classification system and labour market availability data as it applies to the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency. In fact, overall the agency has met or exceeded its national representation goals as compared with the labour market availability for all four employment equity designated groups. Our national representation information for each of the designated groups is shown in the attached chart.

    I can assure you, however, that we are not becoming complacent in any way. We continue our efforts to achieve full representation as we focus on particular areas of under-representation in occupational groups and geographical locations and as we face the challenges of future demographic trends.

    Just to give you a specific example, one of the areas for attention is the under-representation of members of visible minorities in our management ranks. We have begun addressing this issue through increasing the representation of qualified members of visible minorities in our management development programs.

    Of course employment equity is much more than the reporting of representation rates. Within CCRA's multi-year strategic direction for employment equity we are building a corporate culture that supports and directs our employment program. In this regard, our supportive culture is achieved through senior management leadership, built-in accountabilities for employment equity, advisory networks for each of the four designated groups, career development programs, as well as ongoing promotion, education, and training.

    Perhaps most important, employment equity has been more fully integrated into our corporate and human resources business such that employment equity is no longer an add-on human resources program. Our front-line managers make employment equity part of their regular business and their annual planning for human resources requirements. This is the fundamental pragmatic side of employment equity.

    In closing, I will now turn to some observations related in general to the Employment Equity Act.

    Overall, we do not have major changes to recommend. The Employment Equity Act has provided an excellent framework for employers to address the representation of their workforce and to undertake corrective measures where required. However, there are a few related areas that, in our opinion, should be considered for improvement.

    We would recommend that consideration be given to better aligning the definition of “reasonable accommodation” in the Employment Equity Act with the Canadian Human Rights Act, which refers to accommodation up to undue hardship, considering health, safety, and cost.

    A second area for consideration has to do with paragraph 10(1)(d) of the Employment Equity Act that refers to “short-term numerical goals for the hiring and promotion of persons in designated groups.” I underline the word “and”. We would propose that the interpretation of this section, in terms of compliance and reporting, should reflect not that separate individual goals need to be established for each hiring and promotion, but rather that they be considered in combination in terms of how to address representation gaps.

Á  (1115)  

    Finally, I would like to put forward our request that Human Resources Development Canada be formally mandated to support and offer its expertise to separate employers in fulfilling their obligations under the Employment Equity Act.

    This concludes my presentation. My colleagues and I would be pleased to answer the questions you may have.

    Thank you.

    The Chair: You get a gold star; it's the first time we've had a presenter come in under time. We really appreciate it.

    Now I turn it over to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans--not to put too much pressure on you.

    Mr. George Da Pont (Assistant Deputy Minister, Human Resources Sector, Department of Fisheries and Oceans): Thank you, Madam Chairman, because I may use up my colleague's time.

    Like my colleague, I'm pleased to have the opportunity to speak to the committee about employment equity in Fisheries and Oceans Canada. My presentation will provide a very brief overview of the department's mandate and outline our progress to date in implementing employment equity.

    As one of the many public service departments subject to the Employment Equity Act, DFO is committed to implementing employment equity. We're committed to this not simply because it's a legislated obligation but also because we strongly believe that a representative workforce is better able to serve the needs of Canadians in all parts of the country.

    As many of the committee members may know, we have a broad mandate that includes the operations of the Canadian Coast Guard, a science function that includes the Canadian Hydrographic Service, responsibilities for fisheries management, oceans, and aquaculture, as well as all the administrative and policy functions common to all federal departments.

    To carry out this mandate DFO has an organization of about 10,000 employees spread out across all provinces and the three northern territories. Although our employees are deployed predominantly in the coastal areas, there are significant inland operations in Quebec and Ontario and growing numbers of environmental and habitat management personnel in the prairie provinces.

    We are a major federal presence in Atlantic Canada, with three regional offices and 40% of our workforce deployed there. Newfoundland region numbers about 1,600 employees, our Maritimes region about 2,000, and our gulf region about 400. We have about 1,400 employees in Quebec and another 1,100 in our central and Arctic region, which covers an enormous geographic area that includes Ontario, the three prairie provinces, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. Our Pacific region--British Columbia and the Yukon--is the largest, with almost 2,500 employees. And finally, Ottawa headquarters employs another 1,300 staff.

    Given the complexity of our mandate, DFO employs a variety of skills to deliver its mandate. We have about 650 uniformed and armed fisheries officers, about 800 ships' officers, 1,500 ships' crew, about 300 research scientists, 200 engineers, 550 biologists, 750 science technicians, 400 radio operators, 300 electronic technicians, and 400 people in general labour and trade categories. In addition, we have over 1,800 administrative officers and another 1,000 administrative support personnel.

    We have over 500 worksites spread throughout the country and employ people in a variety of work environments, such as ships, laboratories, maintenance shops, and hundreds of small field offices. Our work is very operational, with many blue-collar workers. In this respect we're not a typical public service department at the federal level.

    We have two components to our workforce: a core workforce of about 8,000 employees who are indeterminate--that's been very stable--and a contingent workforce of about 2,000 term and casual employees, where we've had a much higher turnover rate.

    As a department we've had very low rates of attrition in our indeterminate workforce in the past several years, averaging about 250 employees per year, or about 3%. This is well below what I understand to be the public service average of 5% to 6% annual attrition rates. Many of our employees spend their entire careers with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. While this has evident benefits, it has also limited to some extent our opportunities to change the employment equity representational mix very quickly.

    From an employment equity perspective, the ultimate goal we're striving for is to have a representative workforce. As prescribed in the Employment Equity Act, the concept of what is representative is defined in quantitative terms by the labour market availability rates derived from the 1996 census information for women, aboriginal people, and members of a visible minority, and from the health and activity limitation survey of 1991 for persons with disability.

    At the moment we have about 2,911 women in DFO, for a representation rate of 29%, which is very close to the 31% expected level according to labour market availability rates.

Á  (1120)  

    It may be surprising to you to hear that we would be representative with just 31% women, given that the public service as a whole has over 50% women. This is due to the fact that many of our jobs, the ones I mentioned a few minutes ago, have been perceived as non-traditional jobs for women, and these jobs have relatively low labour market availability rates at the moment. One of our challenges is indeed to recruit more women into many of our technical and operational jobs.

    We have about 197 aboriginal employees. According to labour market availability rates, we should have about 250, so we need to recruit about 50 more to close this gap.

    In terms of persons with disabilities, we have 250. Our goal, again based on labour market availability rates, is 420, so we would need to recruit about 210 more to reach this target.

    For members of a visible minority, we have 283. We should have about 520, so on this we would need to recruit about 240 more.

    Having given you this picture, I'd like now to talk for just a minute or two, Madam Chairman, on our experience with the Employment Equity Act since it came into force. For us, the passage of the act itself didn't have an immediate effect of increasing the representation of designated groups. In fact, between 1996 and 2000, our numbers of employees in designated groups did not change very significantly.

    We did improve by 2% or 3% in women's representation, but generally the results for the other employment equity groups were not as good.

Á  (1125)  

     What has happened is that the requirements of the act and our current situation have led us into taking action to address our representation gaps.

    Given the pattern of little improvement in employment equity representation between 1996 and 2000, we set about to improve the situation. The gaps I described are significant, numbering about 700 in total, if you combine the gaps for each of the designated groups. Moreover, most of the gaps relate to particular segments of our workforce, such as science or technical or operational, which further narrows our field of opportunity.

    At the same time, we recognized that over the next few years we would have a significant opportunity to improve the situation. We, like most public service departments, have an aging workforce, and our demographic analysis indicated we could expect much higher numbers of retirements to begin in the next few years and to continue for the better part of a decade.

    Our demographic analysis, which we did as part of the 2000 DFO strategic plan, forecast the need to recruit about 1,500 new indeterminate employees to replace attrition losses in the five-year period from 2000 to 2005. Also, we foresaw the need to recruit up to 500 additional employees over the same period to address program growth, mainly in the inland habitat protection function.

    We saw that recruiting 2000 new employees would afford a major opportunity to improve representation and we recognized that it was critical this opportunity not be lost through lack of planning or lack of tools to enable it to happen.

    The work we did on analyzing our demographics and identifying the opportunities was the first step. To address the need to plan recruitment more effectively, DFO is in the process of creating a recruitment center that will support managers in planning and marketing, with special emphasis and focus on designated groups.

    In terms of the matter of authority, we obtained through section 5 of the Public Service Employment Act the special hiring authorities to allow us to increase our representation. We worked with the Public Service Commission to develop a recruitment program with these authorities that would enable our managers to more readily recruit employment-equity-group employees. This authority applies only in areas where our representation has not reached 80% of the full labour market availability rates.

    Basically, what it means is that we say, for example, if we have 65 visible-minority employees in an area and the full labour market availability rates say we should have 100, that we've achieved 65% of our target. We asked and received from the Public Service Commission extra authority to have specific recruitment of visible minorities until we reach at least 80% of the target; then, from that point on, we would use our normal staffing authorities and processes. So it was designed to give us a tool that would help close the gap a little quicker.

    We also have established a recruitment and retention program for persons with disabilities that has the objective of moving the department forward to full representation levels within a five-year period. We were encouraged to develop this program by the Treasury Board, because there are relatively few programs for persons with disabilities compared with some of the other employment equity groups. This program is supported by the positive measures program intervention fund, and from it we've received about $400,000 a year to pay the salaries of one national coordinator and regional coordinators in each of our seven offices.

    The Chair: Mr. Da Pont, I think I'm going to exercise the chair's prerogative here. I suspect you've got another six or eight minutes' worth, but it's fairly well laid out. It will form part of the record, and I think members of the committee will probably be reading along.

    I always hate to cut off a good presentation, but in the interests of getting the questions we would want to have, I think I'll call it quits at that point.

Á  (1130)  

    Mr. George Da Pont: I appreciate that, Madam Chair.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    I see that we now have a quorum. I'm wondering if I have the committee's understanding to put the question on the adoption of the subcommittee report. I think we can handle this in fairly quick order.

    Ms. Bennett, do you have a motion for us?

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: I move that the draft report of the Subcommittee on the Status of Persons with Disabilities, “Getting it right for Canadians: The Disability Tax Credit”, be adopted as the seventh report of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities, and that the clerk be authorized.... Do you want me to just keep going?

    The Chair: Well, we just lost Mr. Doyle. Please continue; we'll wait for him for the vote.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: I move that the clerk be authorized to make such editorial and typographical changes as necessary without changing the substance of the report; that the chair be authorized to present the report to the House; that the committee print 250 copies of its report in a tumbled bilingual format and that the committee be authorized to produce it in an alternative format if warranted. We also think that's a good idea for the disability committee, Madam Chair. Whenever possible, we prefer alternate format.

    I would also move that, pursuant to Standing Order 109, the committee request that the government provide a comprehensive response to this report.

    There is also, as you know, a supplementary or a complementary opinion from the Bloc Québécois. Do you want me to do that?

    The Chair: Or Madam Guay--whichever.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: Do you have that motion?

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: As I said, it's a complementary opinion that particularly recognizes the extraordinary work and help that we received. It will give our report more of an edge. It's complementary, quite simply. I think that it was accepted by all the parties.

[English]

    The Chair: Ms. Davies.

    Ms. Libby Davies (Vancouver East, NDP): And likewise, if it's possible to leave open the question about whether other parties will provide a complementary opinion, I'd like to check with Ms. Lill, who is our representative. I know she fully supports the report, but as to whether she wanted to put forward a supplementary report, I'll check with her. I don't know that.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: As far as I know, this motion will be that anybody who wants to have a complementary report should have it in, according to the clerk, no later than Friday at two o'clock.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Right.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett: So if she wanted to put anything with it, that would be fine.

    This other motion, for the printing of a complementary or supplementary opinion, is that pursuant to Standing Order 108(1)(a), the committee authorizes the printing of the dissenting or complementary opinion as an appendix to this report immediately after the signature of the chair; that the dissenting or complementary opinions be limited to not more than one page of font 12, line spacing 1.5; and that the dissenting or complementary opinions be delivered in electronic format in both official languages to the clerk of the committee no later than Friday at two o'clock.

    The Chair: Wonderful. Are there any questions or comments?

    (Motion agreed to)

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Now we'll revert to employment equity.

    Mr. Johnston, you could start the first round of questioning, perhaps a five-minute round.

    Mr. Dale Johnston (Wetaskiwin, Canadian Alliance): Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the presenters for appearing before the committee today.

    In the presentation by the CCRA, in your recommendations, point number 18, you recommend “that consideration be given to better aligning the definition of 'reasonable accommodation'...” and up to “...undue hardship considering health, safety and cost”. Would you care to elaborate on that?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Certainly.

    My understanding is that the Employment Equity Act talks in very general terms about reasonable accommodation, and there is a misalignment, from my understanding, in terms of when the Canadian Human Rights Commission undertakes its compliance audits. They are looking more at accommodation in the context of what their act talks about, in terms of undue hardship on an employer, considering health, safety, and cost.

    Our view is that those two elements should be better aligned--that the Canadian Human Rights Act provides a little better clarity than does the Employment Equity Act.

Á  (1135)  

    Mr. Dale Johnston: So you're talking about reasonable accommodation and undue hardship on the employer?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Yes, in instances where there is--I think they call it--a bona fide justification or a bona fide occupational requirement such that the employer could not accommodate particular special measures for employment equity, that could be justified only on the basis where they could indicate there would be undue hardship and spelled it out specifically in terms of elements like health, safety, and cost.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: In the next point after that you talk about short-term numerical goals for hiring and promotion of persons in the designated groups. Do you want to talk a little bit about the merit principle? How do you see the two of them melding, the merit principle and fitting in with the numerical goals?

    Bear in mind that we've heard an awful lot about there being no numerical goals or quotas. We've heard that refuted time and time again, that there are no numerical goals or quotas. But here, you specifically spell out that there are.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: My response to that question is, first of all, that the fundamental premise of course is that when we're talking about employment equity we are continuing to talk about merit and we're continuing to talk about appointing qualified individuals.

    My understanding of what the Employment Equity Act allows an employer to do is that where there is a disadvantage situation and where there is indicated under-representation an employer is able to establish numerical goals in terms of where they would like to move to fill any gaps that exist between the labour market availability and what they actually have in their current workforce.

    This is certainly how we operate in the agency. When we make appointments in those kinds of special circumstances where we're trying to address those gaps, those appointments are made fully on the basis of the qualifications and the competence of the individual.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Thank you.

    If I read this correctly, I understood you to say in the DFO presentation that you now can advertise a position by saying that you want specifically somebody from a designated group, and that all others need not apply. At least that's what I understood from that.

    This is for the CCRA as well. If they concur with advertising that way, my question is what happens if you put out this ad and nobody from the specific group that you had in mind...? Let's say you have your quota in all other groups and you've advertised in one specific area, and nobody from that specific area applies for your job. What do you do now?

    Mr. George Da Pont: We do have that authority, as you say, and we have used it. We only acquired the authority in late summer, so we've used it, actually, in a very limited fashion so far. In fact, I think there have only been 24 instances when we've used it to date. To date we haven't had, to the best of my knowledge, the circumstance that you describe.

    I did want to add, though, like my colleague, that one very important qualifier is that in using this authority we put great emphasis on the individuals having to meet the competencies of the position. That is one of the underlying requirements. It's used in the context of our recruiting of individuals, but it's based on competency, and, like my colleague, having to meet that level of competency.

    We have had one situation that I was aware of, actually before the authority, where we did run a special designated targeted recruitment program. In that particular instance, we didn't get any individuals who qualified at the end of the competition. So it can arise. In that instance we went back to normal hiring.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Do I have any more time?

Á  (1140)  

    The Chair: No, you're at six minutes.

    Madame St-Jacques and then Madame Guay.

[Translation]

    Ms. Diane St-Jacques (Shefford, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    My question is for Mr. Da Pont, and regards disabled persons. In your document, you state that there is a new recruitment and retention program for persons with disabilities. If I understand correctly, you have hired a national coordinator and a regional coordinator for each region, and this seems to have produced concrete results, because within a period of nine months, you have hired 24 disabled persons.

    My question is in two parts. What are you doing exactly to improved recruitment? Also, given that the process seems to be producing results, is there a way to take best practices and share them with other departments or other organizations? When something works well, it's a good idea to share the solution so that others can improve their processes.

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: Yes, I think the point you made is in fact a very good one. Our experience is that our difficulty in hiring a lot of people in both the handicapped and visible minority categories is we're a very large, decentralized operational department scattered all over the country, and most of our hiring is done in small local offices and obviously by a great many managers. What these individuals do is they work with managers to target positions, actual positions, and then they have the contacts and do the outreach with organizations and representatives of handicapped people and help facilitate match-ups.

    Again, we're in not quite the first year of the program. The result for us is we've had the best recruitment we've ever had using that program. I think it works for us because of the very diversified nature of the recruitment, and that really provides an ability to plug in and do the outreach, which individual managers have a great deal of difficulty doing, particularly if they're in smaller rural communities.

    For us, the program's been a big success. In fact since we did these stats in the last three months, we've hired an additional 12. So we found it was an ability to get very good match-ups and very highly qualified people for specific targeted positions.

    Whether it's a program that would work for others, which was the second part of your question, I'd say we'd like to maybe have a bit more experience of working with it, but for us it's been very successful.

[Translation]

    Ms. Diane St-Jacques: But for now, there is no process for information exchange between departments that would lead them to benefit from the methods that you are using. There is nothing on that front.

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: Yes, and one of the things we're now doing, for example, is we're looking at taking a leadership role with science-based departments for that element so we would in fact use some of our resources in common to facilitate some of their hiring as well. We're beginning to look at that.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Madam Guay.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Welcome. Your statistics are interesting and it's good to see progress. However, I see that there are 56.4% of the employees at Canada Customs and Revenue Agency who are women. I would like to get a breakdown to know the positions these women hold. In the general statistics, we see that there are women, but in lower paying positions. Therefore, I ask you through the good graces of our Chair to provide a breakdown. That would give us a good idea of the situation. My objective is not to criticize you, but to see if women are truly progressing as we wish through the management ranks. The statistics show that the number of women is increasing, but in positions of $45,000 and less. If you have this breakdown, I would appreciate it if you could send it to us.

    Here is my second question. Point 20 in the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency document states:

Finally, I would like to put forward our request that Human REsources Development Canada (HRDC) be formally mandated to support and offer its expertise to separate employers in fulfilling their obligations under the Employment Equity Act.

    What do you mean by this, exactly? What do you want Human Resources to do or what role do you want them to play precisely? I would like you to clarify your request.

Á  (1145)  

[English]

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Yes. Thank you very much.

    With respect to the details in terms of the representation of women in our organization, you've actually raised a very good point. As I mentioned in my presentation, we do have representation rates that look very good at the national level, but there are certain areas where we do need to drill down and look in terms of particular occupations, levels, and so on and so forth.

    When we look in terms of our female population--I'm trying to find the exact report here--we divide our employment equity occupations into a number of areas: you have middle manager level, professional level, supervisory level, administrative, program, clerical, as well as executive.

    At the executive level, our representation rate is somewhere in the range of 30%. It's slightly below 30%, actually, and it's a little bit less than what the labour market availability is telling us. And we are working on that area, as I mentioned as well, through our management development programs, where we actually have a 50% participation rate of women.

    As well, in terms of the other areas of representation, in terms of middle management and so on, the representation rate is in the range of 40%, which is close to, if not almost above, labour market availability. You're right as well, though, that in terms of levels of income when you look at our agency we do need to improve the representation at the higher levels, and that's one of the reasons we are working very much on our management development programs.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: What role do you wish to see Human Resources Development Canada play? Can you answer this question?

[English]

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: As a federal government department, my colleague Mr. Da Pont's department, Fisheries and Oceans, has access to the Treasury Board Secretariat as a service that will support and provide advice on workforce analysis, developing an employment equity plan, and providing advice and direction. As a separate employer, the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency doesn't have that support any longer from the Treasury Board Secretariat. Human Resources Development Canada, I understand, offers that support to federally regulated employers in the private sector.

    Separate employers are a little bit sitting in the middle of nowhere, in no man's land, without any particular support, other than up until this year Human Resources Development Canada has been funded by Treasury Board Secretariat, I understand, to provide support for separate employers. We've actually used that support, and it's been very helpful, but I understand that funding may be ending this fiscal year.

    We would suggest and like to support that Human Resources Development Canada be mandated to continue to offer that service to the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency and separate employers. We want them to continue to provide that advice and counsel in terms of how we do our workforce analysis, in terms of helping us interpret the data, and helping us develop our employment equity plans, and so on, as experts in the field of the Employment Equity Act.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Here is one last question. Do you think that the unions should play a more important role regarding application of the Act? They appeared before us. They told us that they could play a bigger role between the employer and employees, that they could offer services, that they could lend a hand to help us meet the requirements of the Act. Do you think that unions should play a greater role in the application of the Act?

[English]

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I guess I could start with a response to that question.

    The Employment Equity Act requires the employers to consult and to collaborate with the unions, the legitimate representatives of the employees, in employment equity matters and relationships. We do that at the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency. We work with our public service unions. We consult with them and talk with them when we want to develop our strategic goals and our strategic plans and directions. We also consult with them when we want to make changes to our policies, procedures, and processes. In fact, our unions are very active in the employment equity area. They have conferences and regular meetings on that subject, and we are often involved with them in that process.

    Quite frankly, I think it is working reasonably well. There are always areas for improvement in terms of relationships, but I think we continue to work reasonably well with our unions and it's at an appropriate level at this point in time.

Á  (1150)  

    The Chair: Mr. Da Pont.

    Mr. George Da Pont: Basically, I have the same general points as my colleague. We also think it's very important, notwithstanding whatever the legislative requirements are, to develop effective and cooperative working relationships with the unions. As a matter of fact, we also meet with them regularly, specifically on employment equity. We met with them within the last month, for example, and we are trying to engage the unions in working with us in conducting a self-identification survey, which is currently under way in the department, and in discussing our overall goals and management of the program. We think that's a pretty critical aspect to making it effective.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. McGuire, and then Ms. Davies.

    Mr. Joe McGuire (Egmont, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I have a question for Mr. Burkholder. When you switched from being a department to an agency, did you find any great difference in your ability to hire who you wanted, when you wanted, rather than when you were a department?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I think the transition from a department under the Treasury Board as employer, shifting to a separate employer, has offered us some flexibilities and some opportunities to be a little bit more creative and innovative in terms of how we manage our organization.

    Certainly from a human resources point of view, as a separate employer we now have these authorities in terms of negotiating our collective agreements and being able to tailor those to the particular requirements of our organization. It has also enabled us to develop and work on a staffing and hiring regime that is responsive and tailored to the business needs of the organization.

    So it has given us those flexibilities, as well as building a very strong accountability framework for us in terms of how we manage our human resources. We are still consistent with the values of the broader public service in terms of being non-partisan, and in terms of representativeness and employment equity.

    So we have made the transition, and it has afforded us wonderful opportunities to redesign some of the ways we do things and do them in a little bit more efficient and effective manner, particularly in the area of human resources. But at the same time, we have maintained very strong accountabilities in our system in terms of our human resource management structure.

    Mr. Joe McGuire: It appears that you have a lot more casual determinate positions now than you had before. People can no longer rely on having a career with your agency, as they used to have when you were a department. Is that a fair criticism?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I don't really think it is a fair assessment. I'm not sure I can challenge you statistically, but my understanding is that the agency does have a very active recruitment program. We have a very good measure of employees who stay with us for a significant period of time.

    In terms of casual and term employees, the nature of our business and tax season of course suggests that we need to be able to recruit a number of employees on a seasonal basis. This is one of the particular periods when we do have a high number of employees engaged. But we also undertake selection processes and hire individuals in a competitive process, and we do pretty well at attracting employees.

    I think my colleague made reference to his separation rate. I think our separation rate is somewhere in the range of 3% to 4%, which is not overly inconsistent with the rest of the public service. I would like to think we continue to offer very good employment opportunities, and we still do attract a lot of people.

    Mr. Joe McGuire: You certainly employ a lot of people, which is good.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: In all parts of the country.

    Mr. Joe McGuire: Mr. Da Pont, in the hiring of aboriginals you're behind your goals. With the Marshall decision and the fact that a lot of aboriginals are now in the fishery and they're taking a very active role in the fishery and would like to do more protection, inspection, and so on, not just in the aboriginal fishery but in the commercial fisheries, why would you be having such difficulty getting up to scratch on those numbers?

    Mr. George Da Pont: We are making a concerted effort and the numbers are improving significantly, but I think you're right that we have additional work to do in this area. Part of it has been, as I mentioned, our attrition rates have been fairly low. So when you're dealing with 200 or 300 openings a year across the country it's going to take a bit of time. That's the reason why we have done a fair bit of work for all of the designated groups, and that's to identify some specific targets we'd like to reach. The counterpart to what we're doing with persons with disabilities is we are trying very hard to have more inroads into the aboriginal communities, and in dealing with first nations we are trying to encourage more people to work with the department. So we're making a concerted effort, and I think we're making progress.

    The other issue that comes up with a number of our employees is that the figures I gave you are the figures based on people who have self-identified, and we have a significant number of people who probably are aboriginal who have not self-identified and don't count in the figures. We're now in the process of doing a far more structured self-identification survey, which we hope will encourage people to self-identify, but in some cases there's probably still a reluctance to do that. So our on-the-ground situation is probably a bit better than the numbers indicate.

Á  (1155)  

    Mr. Joe McGuire: Do you have a proactive role to play with this particular target group, or do you just let it happen?

    Mr. George Da Pont: No, we've been very proactive with this group, as we have been with the others, because obviously the statistics I gave you indicate--and this is one of the reasons why I put out the statistics--that as a department we recognize that we have the challenge on representativeness, that we're not as representative as a fair number of other federal government departments. I think there are a variety of reasons for it, but we've taken very concerted action as a management team to really try to emphasize that and to put in place measures to improve it. We agree completely with you that we need to have better representation of aboriginal people and others and that we need to build better relationships to do that.

    Mr. Joe McGuire: You say you're very centralized and a lot of the hiring is done from the local level. Of course, your procedures become much more visible. Being an MP from an area that has a lot of local hiring done, I get a lot of calls about who you're hiring and the reasons you're hiring, and so on. Do you get many inquiries up through the system about people not being hired on the merit principle, that they're being hired because of the people the interview board knows?

    Mr. George Da Pont: Yes, there have been a few that have come to me with that. But to be honest, in the time I've been in this job, which has been about a year, it's been a handful. I don't have a great number of those coming to me.

    We've tried to be very proactive with our employees, in terms of trying to explain why we feel this is important. We've also done it, as I've tried to lay out, in the context of recognizing that we have increasingly major recruitment requirements that will provide a range of opportunities, both for our employees internally and for bringing in new people. We have tried to balance it so that there's opportunity both for those within and for people being recruited, aside from people from designated groups.

    I haven't had a whole lot of people coming to me feeling that either they're being denied an opportunity or we are hiring people who are not competent for the jobs. That is our number one priority, in terms of running our recruitment drives.

    The Chair: Thank you. That's it, Mr. McGuire. You're well over your time.

    Ms. Davies, Mr. Malhi, and then Mr. Johnston.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Thank you very much, Madam Chairperson.

    To the witnesses, thank you for coming today. I think it's useful to have perspectives from both a department and an agency, and to see what the differences are.

    I wanted to focus my comments and questions on persons with disabilities. I know we've had representation from the Canadian Human Rights Commission, as well as from employment equity consultants who deal with people with disabilities. One of the things that sort of stuck in my brain is that often what people with disabilities face in the workplace is almost a fear from other people, in terms of employers not even wanting to ask, “What are your issues? What can we do to assist you?”. So we end up with a situation where there are often erroneous assumptions made about a person's capability or lack of capacity to do something that maybe isn't there.

    One of the things I'm very concerned about, and I want to know whether or not it's a problem for the department.... I don't know whether this is true for the agency. The Public Service Commission has had the employment equity positive measures program in place. My understanding is that this is actually closing at the end of the month. They specifically also included the Employment Equity Enabling Resource Centre for Persons with Disabilities. From what I've read, this is particularly important.

    As we all know, most people enter the federal workforce through contract or term positions or through casual employment. I think being able to make those kinds of assessments about what people with disabilities need, and assisting employers to do that, would be very important. If we don't have that, then we run the risk of employers not making decisions to hire those people because they just don't feel they know what they need or they tend to be maybe overcautious. I wanted to ask you whether or not, as a department--I'm not sure about as an agency--you are able to make use of those resources. Maybe you could let me know whether or not you have.

    I also wanted to raise with the committee whether or not there's an awareness that this program is apparently shutting down. This seems rather contradictory, given that we're in the middle of a review. I wonder if we might have some information on this and at least have it put on hold until we've done our review and can determine whether or not it is a priority that this should be closed down.

    Would you like to answer the question about how you've been able to use this service? As a department, are those kinds of resources important to you?

  (1200)  

    Mr. George Da Pont: Yes, as I think I outlined, we have obviously taken advantage of that program, and it's been very effective for us. So we are going to keep those resources in place in our department, whatever the decisions are.

    Ms. Libby Davies: But if the program closes down I would assume that every department has to develop its own policies and you now would have to do it within your own department. So in regard to the assisted technologies you could get on loan from this program, where will you get that from now?

    Mr. George Da Pont: Yes, it would be much more difficult for us. There's no question. What we would look to do is try to partner with other departments, because it's very difficult for a single department, even a large one like ourselves, to maintain or to duplicate that capacity.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Would that be a voluntary thing you have to do, whereby you have to go canvass whatever department you happen to have a good working relationship with to figure out whether you can share? It just seems so counterproductive to leave each department to figure this out. And if you do that, what impact will it have, or do you know at this point what impact it will have, on other allocations? So are you basically robbing Peter to pay Paul, taking out of one pocket to now compensate and fund this type of resource within your department?

    Mr. George Da Pont: It's hard for me to answer your question with precision because there are obviously elements to what you're outlining. With us, our main focus on the program so far has been very much on the recruitment side, which is how we've used most of the resource to date. I don't think we've had as yet very much reliance on some of the other aspects that you've described.

    I also wanted to comment a bit on one of the other points you made in support for individuals in the workplace, because that is a very important aspect, especially on the retention side, once you've hired people. I think the things we're trying to do at the departmental level, and I hope fairly effectively, is we're trying to provide opportunities for networking and opportunities for mentoring. We've put a fair bit of effort as a department into offering diversity training and harassment-free training as a department. We've put a tremendous amount of effort into that for all of our employees to help create a bit more understanding and comfort in the workplace. We're doing an awful lot of that.

  (1205)  

    Ms. Libby Davies: As you're now an agency, were you able to access this resource centre for persons with a disability, or were you cut off from that the moment you became an agency?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I'll ask my colleague Elaine to address that in greater detail.

    Ms. Elaine Courtney (Director of Employment Equity Programs, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency): No, we weren't cut off. There was always an arrangement that we could continue to use the centre. We were using their expertise in terms of getting some advice on some of the issues, and also we had access to the loans, the technical aid loan bank, where we have been able to borrow equipment for a short term in terms of short-term hiring. But in terms of the long term, we do have our own internal resources available, so we have a fund of $215,000 a year reserved for the purchase of technical aids. This is to support managers in the purchase of larger equipment. They purchase the smaller ones. So if it's amounts that are less than a certain amount, they do their own purchase.

    We have done a lot of awareness around disability issues. Training called “Ability in Disability” has been given for the past four years in the organization to over 6,000 or 7,000 employees and managers up to now to make them aware of the disabilities as well as abilities in disabilities, which is the name of the course. This is inteneded to make our corporate culture more inclusive and appropriate for people to be able to ask.

    In addition to that, we've just developed a new course called “Just Ask Me”, which is being rolled out now, to better support managers and employees in knowing what the duty to accommodate is all about. It's to make it more comfortable for people to ask for accommodation and for managers to know where the resources are and what you can do and what you must do. Roles and responsibilities are in that course and it's very well laid out in terms of what their obligations are.

    So we've structured ourselves--

    Ms. Libby Davies: I just want to ask you about the letter, though, that was addressed to you from the CNIB, and whether or not we are going to--

    The Chair: I've just talked to him to have him put something together for us.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Okay, because it seems pretty awful that it's going to close down in a couple of weeks and we're in the middle of a review.

    The Chair: We'll get more information for you.

    Mr. Malhi, Mr. Johnston, and then Madame Folco.

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi (Bramalea--Gore--Malton--Springdale, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    First of all, I want to give some credit to the CCRA, because it has met all its targets for the four designated groups of the Employment Equity Act. Do you have any suggestions as to how the goals of the act can better be met so that the other federal public service departments follow to achieve this goal?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Yes. We have met with fairly good success, and quite frankly, I think part of it has to do with us working very hard at employment equity at the agency. As I alluded to earlier in my presentation, it is something that is very much part of our regular ongoing business.

    We work with our managers in the field. When we do our human resource planning, for example, we build in all employment equity plans and objectives in that whole process so that we are starting from square one in an integrated way when we're looking at our resourcing requirements.

    We also have very strong leadership in our organization, right from the top, right from our commissioner and our deputy commissioner through our assistant commissioners. We have not only a network of human resource individuals in the field, like employment equity coordinators, but also, amongst our senior managers in the field, some of the directors of our tax centres and our tax service officers are employment equity champions for their particular regions.

    In fact, I can say this: At the agency, being a person in human resources, I've found that very often it is management that is pushing human resources in the agency, as opposed to human resources pushing management, in the employment equity area. That's quite wonderful. We do have a very solid network of leadership and managers engaged in the process.

    As well, we have undertaken very strong efforts in terms of our recruitment planning to connect, to outreach with the communities for the four designated groups, to ensure that when we do our advertising and go out to recruit, the opportunity is there.

    I guess the two fundamental foundations in terms of an effective employment equity plan are, first, education, supporting it with management direction, with part of your culture; and secondly, it's about opportunity. It's about making sure that you level the playing field and do the best you can to get the information out and promote employment equity and promote your employment opportunities in the areas where you need to improve your representation.

  (1210)  

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: During the last so many years, we have had many qualified people come here as newcomers. Does your department or agency recognize foreign credentials? Do you have any problems recognizing foreign credentials?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: With regard to foreign credentials, my understanding is that there's a responsibility in terms of the provinces to establish equivalency for those foreign credentials. Where that is done, we have absolutely no problem accepting those foreign credentials where the equivalency has been established.

    As well, my understanding is that there are equivalency tools, assessment tools that are available--for example, university equivalencies, and so on--to determine qualifications. So it is a responsibility of the individual to determine the portability of those credentials, but indeed, where that is done, we have no problem accepting them.

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: My last question is to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans.

    The department has not achieved a representative workforce among any of these groups. What is the single reason they are not meeting these goals?

    Mr. George Da Pont: We've tried to assess quite a bit over the last while, and it's very difficult to come up with a single reason. We can come up with things that hinder us. As I mentioned, we're large, decentralized, operational, and we've had a very low attrition rate. I guess the only point I would make is that taking all that into account, we obviously haven't had the results we should have had.

    That is why as a management team, a year and a half ago we took a very systematic approach to this. We analyzed our situation very carefully. We set specific targets that we would like people to try to meet, and those are broken down by region, obviously depending on labour market availability. We've implemented a very structured monitoring program so that we come back to our senior management table with the results. We built into the accountability accords between our deputy minister and all the assistant deputy ministers and the regional directors general a key commitment to make progress on getting a representative workforce.

    As I've mentioned, we've been very proactive in trying to get some tools that would help move us along a bit better. I think over the past year we have made significant progress compared to our track record in the past. We're committed to trying to achieve a representative workforce as quickly as we can.

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: Do you have any plans to report your employment equity plans to the Minister of Labour in the future?

    Mr. George Da Pont: Do we have employment equity plans?

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: Yes. Is your department prepared to have its own employment equity plans and reports? Do you have any objection to tabling your department's planned equity report with the Minister of Labour?

    Mr. George Da Pont: We certainly have employment equity plans at both the national and each of the regional levels. In terms of whether we can table them, I'd have to check into that. I believe they're public documents, but I'd have to verify that.

  (1215)  

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Malhi.

    Mr. Johnston, Madame Folco, Madame Guay, and Ms. Davies. I think we'll call it an end with that.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I know Madame Guay asked some questions regarding the Human Resources participation in your final recommendation, to support and offer expertise to separate employers in fulfilling their obligations. What do you see as the biggest function of Human Resources in that capacity? Do you think there would be any financial implications to the Department of Human Resources as a result of that recommendation?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Human Resources Development Canada has a very high degree of expertise with respect to the Employment Equity Act and with respect to the regulations, the procedures, and the policy requirements under that act. They can be very helpful in providing us with advice and support, in helping us interpret some of the workforce analysis information and so on, and in helping us deal with particular issues.

    In terms of whether or not that would involve funding, I'm not sure I'm really the one who would be able to answer that question. I know we would be very supportive of having the ability to continue to work with HRDC, as we have in the past in some capacities, whereby they could provide us with support, guidance, and so on, and we could draw upon the expertise they have in that area.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: If the delivery of this information and expertise would require more staff, more personnel in HRDC, then it definitely would have budgetary implications. But I was just asking if you thought maybe they could do it with the staff they have or if they would require more. Maybe that's not a fair question to ask you.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: It would be difficult for me to answer that question.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Then I'll change gears and ask you what kind of preferential hiring you give or what consideration you give to older workers if older workers aren't mentioned in the act. Do you have, either one of you, either your department or Fisheries and Oceans, any policy that allows for the hiring of experienced workers?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I would probably answer that in two ways. First of all, maybe I should think about it as I get a little bit older.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: I think we all should.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: May I think about that answer for a moment?

    The Chair: We don't know what qualifies as old.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: Make it over 50 and I'll change my answer.

    The Chair: That will cover almost everyone here.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: There are a couple of things. Quite frankly, from my perspective I think that's a broader public service policy issue, as opposed to a particular perspective from myself in terms of whether or not we should include that as a designated group. I think there have been discussions around that before, and I think there have been opinions expressed by some of the authorities, if you will, in terms of the Canadian Human Rights Commission and so on in that area.

    I suppose the converse is that no, we do not have anything in particular that would focus on older workers, but we also have no particular practices that would suggest that we would do anything against older workers.

    Mr. Dale Johnson: So you might hire them?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: In fact as we face these demographics of the future in terms of the baby boomers leaving the public service and leaving our agency in particular, if older workers want to continue to stay working that would be wonderful.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: But if they wanted to apply? I'm not talking about keeping them on; I'm talking about whether you would you hire a worker, an experienced worker. Let's say an experienced worker--it sounds a little more politically correct, because an older worker could be anybody over 35 for all I know.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: When you look at the demographics, actually that probably is the case. The populations in most federal agencies and institutions are older than 35.

    I can't answer that in the context of the Employment Equity Act or any particular special measures and so on. I can only answer on the question that we go through the process of hiring individuals based on their qualifications and we advertise in a manner such that everybody's eligible to apply. I can't go any further on that in terms of the employment equity.

  (1220)  

    Mr. Dale Johnston: In my opinion, that's exactly how it should be done. It should be advertised to everybody who's available and the best person for the job should get the job. So I'm glad to hear you say that.

[Translation]

    The Chair: Ms. Folco.

    Ms. Raymonde Folco (Laval West, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I am very happy to follow Mr. Johnston, because I too am going to speak about demographics.

    Yesterday, we saw a report on flat demographic growth, especially in Quebec, my home province. We are very worried about what is going to happen with the labour market. Obviously, the big question facing us deals with a potential labour shortage within 15 to 20 years, and perhaps even earlier. Given this potential shortage, and given that some people think that one of the solutions--and I repeat, one--is immigration, a significant number of persons who could address this shortage, what do you think would be the job potential for designated groups? Do you think that the Employment Equity Program should continue? Do you even think that there would be an increase in employment equity programs because of this? That is my first question.

    The second question is related to the first. How do you see preparations for an increased employment and equity program within your organization?

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: I'd respond to at least some aspects of your question first by asking, do we see these programs continuing far into the future? It's very hard for me to answer. Intellectually, I'd say probably not. In our department we recognize we're starting from further back than we probably should be. We need these programs and these tools to help us develop a representative workforce, and also to create an internal culture in the department that is actually sensitive to the subject.

    We hope, obviously, that once we have a representative workforce, our efforts in diversity training, cross-cultural training, and the other aspects we're putting a great deal of effort into will create within our department the type of culture that is supportive and inclusive of all aspects and all groups in society.

    What concerns us in tying some of the last two questions together is that when we look at our demographics--and I suspect they're no different from many other federal government departments'--we're going to have, beginning in a couple of years, an increasingly large number of people leaving. Obviously the recruitment pool is very different from what it was 40 years ago. We have very little concern about whether there's availability of qualified people, in terms of representativeness. We feel that if we have a welcoming culture and are seen as a department that puts emphasis on it, we'll attract and keep people. That's where I see us. How long we need some of these special programs, I don't know. It's hard for me to speculate.

    On the other issue, concerning older workers, most of our thinking is a bit different. Again it's tied to our demographics. We envision losing a tremendous amount of knowledge as people retire, and particularly in some of our jobs where--for example, in a lot of our science function--we have world-quality scientists that you don't replace immediately or quickly.

    One of the things we're concerned about and are trying to plan for is what we can do to facilitate more of a transfer of knowledge from people who are leaving to people who are coming in. We're wrestling with that as a department, recognizing its importance as we lose this knowledge. We're more focused on that angle and are trying to focus some of our planning on it.

    I'm not sure if that responds entirely to your question.

  (1225)  

    Ms. Raymonde Folco: I'll come back, but I'll let Mr. Burkholder, perhaps....

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I have to agree with a fair amount of what my colleague has said. There is a fundamental challenge here; there's no question about it. In fact, recently in our organization we spent a fair amount of time talking exactly about what our longer-term recruitment strategies are going to be for our agency as we face something like a 30% decline in our aging population over the next six to seven years.

    As well, we take into consideration the fact that it appears, based on the 2001 census, the employers of this country are going to rely more and more on the workforce coming through immigration to sustain employment rates. That is certainly something we are looking at and are planning for.

    Indeed, as far as the agency is concerned, we have a policy that we hire on the basis of whether or not individuals have permanent resident status; it is very helpful to be able to hire individuals who have permanent resident status in Canada. I don't know whether that answers the question any further.

[Translation]

    Ms. Raymonde Folco: This comment is particularly addressed to Mr. Da Pont. Wouldn't it be useful for you and your department to identify your specific needs to the Minister of Immigration so that the selection criteria for new immigrants are more favourable to the persons you wish to see enter Canada? The criteria are always discretionary, isn't that correct?

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: Quite frankly, that's something we hadn't thought of. We'll certainly consider that in our planning.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Ms. Guay and then Ms. Davies.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Thank you, Madam Chair.

    If at 35 years old, a worker is old, there are no youngsters at this table. The word "youth" will no longer exist.

    Jokes aside, I think that in any case, there are people of all ages in the workplace. I don't think we can discriminate against older people or that they should be pushed out because they are 50 or older. We can really benefit from their experience, also. Therefore, I think that you will keep your job. You don't have to worry.

    That being said, we ask employees to self-identify in departments or companies if they are members of a designated group. There is no obligation, but they are asked to do so. Are you getting good results from this? Does the process work?

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: It has been, to some extent, but in our department we haven't been doing it in as structured and coherent a way as we should. Right now, we're in the process of conducting a structured self-identification survey. We're doing it based on the best practices of several other departments that have done it in the last little while, with very good results.

    As you've noted, people are not required to self-identify; it's a voluntary thing. But we are contacting each individual in the department personally, and we prepared promotional material they can consider in advance, outlining the benefits of self-identification for the organization as a whole, and the importance of it.

    Those departments that have done it in the structured way we're now modeled after have had some significant improvement in their results, in terms of self-identification, and we're hoping for the same thing. We are putting in place, on an ongoing basis, a more structured way of doing it than we did in the past.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: The last time the agency--we would have been a department under the public service--did one of those structured surveys across 40,000-some employees, we had a very good return rate of somewhere over 70%, if I recall correctly.

    I agree with my colleague, as well, that we're working on this very much on an ongoing basis, as individuals join the agency, and so on. It is established that it is not obligatory. It is something we work at and like to promote, in terms of supporting the whole thing.

  (1230)  

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: We can't force people to fill in a form, but you should have this information for your records and to identify areas where you should make efforts, and what measures you should take. There is important turnover at the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency and at the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. When employees leave their job for one reason or another, do you indicate for statistical purposes whether these people were part of a designated group under the Act, so that they can be replaced by persons from the designated group?

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: Again, the point you raise is very important, and we are beginning to do this for everyone. We are beginning to institute an exit interview process. We want to interview anyone who leaves our department, if they're willing, to understand the reasons they're leaving and get their feedback on their impressions and experience in working with the department.

    Where this has been done by private sector companies, they have found it to be a very helpful management tool to identify improvements they could consider in the operation of their organization and the culture.

    So we're starting to do that. We're not doing it as systematically as we'd like yet, but we think that's going to be a very important tool for everyone, not just members of designated groups.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Do you replace outgoing people from designated groups with similar persons? Do you try to find people coming from the same sector to fill these positions? When a person leaves because of a promotion in another domain, for example, do you try to replace that person from another person from the same designated sector?

[English]

    Mr. George Da Pont: No, we don't do it on that basis. We don't do it on a position-by-position basis. To be honest, I think it wouldn't be a good idea. I think it might run the risk of people being stigmatized in some fashion. We do it on the basis of competence. It varies position by position. We don't necessarily replace people from one designated group that leave with the same group.

[Translation]

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: If you please, I will ask Elaine Courtney to reply to your question.

    Ms. Elaine Courtney: Yes, we look at the departure statistics. Also, we must report on departure statistics as well. It is very important to continue monitoring this because departures and our current resources are part of our demographic analysis. Naturally, we also track departures from the public service and compare numbers to find how we are doing against the rest of the public service and see if we are having particular problems. We did this for the first time this year, because we are now an agency. These statistics were revealing. In fact, there were less problems that we thought. We found this to be a good indicator. This also gives us the necessary information to see in which sectors we should have exit interviews.

    There are special groups that are under-represented and we have been able to conduct interviews in these groups in certain regions. We conduct exit interviews to identify problems and change the system.

    Ms. Monique Guay: Thank you.

[English]

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Johnston, you had a point of order. Did you want to raise it now?

    Mr. Dale Johnston: I would have liked to, Madam Chairman, if Carolyn Bennett had been here. I would like to raise a point of order on the report we received today.

  (1235)  

    The Chair: Maybe we should wait. We'll let the witnesses finish, if it's not on this particular one.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: No. This is on the unanimous report.

    The Chair: Okay, then we'll go to Ms. Davies and come back to your point of order.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Thank you, Madam Chair.

    I have just a quick question. I often think of employment equity from two main streams: one is the recruitment, people coming into an organization and what the representation is; but there's also a very major stream and issue about what happens to people when they're within the department. It's not just a quantitative thing; it's a very qualitative thing.

    To the agency and the department that are here today, I wonder if you could briefly touch on, in terms of the recruitment, do you guys actually go out and not solicit, but look at different ways of recruiting people, or do you just rely on what you put in the paper or through the Public Service Commission? Maybe again it's more flexible for the agency.

    Secondly, within the department, I think both the agency and the department are under-represented in all the target areas in terms of management positions. This is a very difficult question, because even in things like interviewing, where a manager may score on whether or not they believe an applicant is aggressive, there may be people from other cultures, maybe women, who don't score well on that but may actually have very strong leadership and management characteristics, but they're not characterized in that way. There are all these very qualitative kinds of issues that I would think can be an enormous barrier. So I wonder if you could identify, from within your agency and department, what you see as some of those barriers in terms of promotions internally for the target groups.

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: First, in terms of your points on external recruitment, as an agency we have a certain amount of flexibility, and we've developed a very active recruitment program in staffing our organization.

    Maybe I'd ask Christine Coffey to make a few comments on some of the points you raised on how we do our recruiting.

    Ms. Libby Davies: And particularly on how it might differ from a department, knowing that you've gone from one into the other.

    Ms. Christine Coffey (Director, Resourcing and Career Management Division, Canada Customs and Revenue Agency): There are a couple of things. Obviously becoming a separate employer allowed us the flexibility to have direct access. We have direct authority to do our own recruitment and put in place specific programs to address the agency's requirements.

    What we actively did in the first year of the agency was actually look at our recruitment requirements. We did some significant human resources planning, targeted both in terms of what our external and internal recruitment needs were, to be able to link also to employment equity.

    We've established a couple of things. We connect on an annual basis to all the employment equity associations. Through these associations, locally, regionally, and nationally, we promote and market our job opportunities and the agency as an employer of choice. It has allowed us to promote, market, and even have designated the career fairs that are targeted to employment equity groups.

    We certainly work with the internal national advisory committees in establishing national committees looking at the initiatives that need to be undertaken to support employment equity, both internally and externally. So we work very closely with our employment equity coordinators in designing recruitment strategies, as well as with the external associations in promoting CCRA as an employer of choice.

    I would just add, internally as well, as an agency we've established core competencies. One of those core competencies for all our employees is actually linked to diversity and supporting employment equity. So this is part of our cultural change, where it has been communicated that for all our employees there's a clear competency requirement of supporting employment equity and diversity, both internally and through our external hiring process.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Do you have diversity training for managers within the workplace so that they can be aware of the biases they might have that they might not know about in terms of how they evaluate people or how they do interviews, and so on? Does diversity training take place?

    Ms. Christine Coffey: I'll talk to the human resource committee, and then my colleague can address the broader training. But, yes, managers are trained in terms of diversity as it applies to recruitment and as part of that process of hiring, both internally and externally. It's part of the mandatory training they undertake in order to have the authority to make hiring decisions. So that is integrated into our learning products in terms of supporting our managers.

  (1240)  

    Ms. Libby Davies: Is that a one-time thing? Would a manager get that once, or is that an ongoing program where every year, for example, they're taking some training in valuing diversity in the workplace or whatever?

    Ms. Christine Coffey: For purposes of authorities and for the ongoing development of managers, whether it be our leadership program or other kinds of programs, we integrate employment equity principles and approaches within that training. Every time we go to staff a position managers are reminded of their obligations in terms of employment equity and representativeness. I think there's clearly some ongoing training as it applies to employment equity, which my colleague can address further.

    Ms. Elaine Courtney: We do have ongoing diversity training, which managers sign up for. In addition, we have aboriginal awareness training, which has been ongoing for a number of years now. We have a course on ability and disability for persons with disabilities. In addition to that, in two regions, and it might be going across the country, they've put in place an initiative whereby they have a list of persons from the designated groups trained to participate in selection boards so that managers have easy access to designated group members and have a more representative selection board. That has been very successful in two of the regions so far where there's a pilot project, and they're now looking at the results. We have received some positive comments on that, and that's something that I think is going to be ongoing. So those are all key elements that have been put in place to ensure that the corporate culture is there to support our organization in pushing forward the agenda.

    Mr. George Da Pont: Like the agency, at Fisheries and Oceans we've made considerable effort to ensure that inclusiveness is part of our staff training courses. It's also included in all of our management training courses. So it's integrated into our normal training as a matter of course.

    In addition to that, over the last couple of years we've put a significant effort into diversity and cross-cultural training, a very specific course, for all of our managers and staff in general. We're also including a component of this in another very generalized training we're running in terms of a harassment-free workplace. So we've integrated both into our normal training that anyone would do, depending on levels as they move through the system, and we've also had a very targeted, specific effort.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Burkholder, did you have one last comment?

    Mr. Paul Burkholder: I think it has been pretty well covered. It is a very important point in terms of it being a corporate culture, and a supportive work environment is very important to the advancement of the programs.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    To our witnesses from CCRA and DFO, on behalf of the committee I want to thank you for your very thoughtful presentation. Not only your comments but your written material and the responses to the questions will help us immensely as we review the Employment Equity Act. I thank you for coming.

    There's one final item for the committee. Mr. Johnston, you had a point of order you wanted to raise.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Thank you.

    The day before yesterday, Madam Chairman, we received in our office by e-mail a note from the minister's office saying that this is basically how you deal with inquiries regarding the disability tax exemption. I'm pretty offended by the timing of all of this. The minister has had since sometime in October 2001 to respond to this issue, and she chose to take no action whatsoever until two days prior to the subcommittee reporting to our committee. Our committee has not yet had the chance to report the findings of the subcommittee to the minister's office, and two days prior to that she comes out with this directive to say this is how it's done.

    I would have no problem if she had done this six months or a year ago and allowed the committee to do the work, but she chose, apparently, to just cut the work of the subcommittee and the committee off at the knees. Unless I'm reading this entirely wrong, I think this is a very inappropriate action for a minister of the crown to take. I would like to register my strong objection to this kind of action. If committees have no more relevance to the minister than this, then I for one have other things to do.

  (1245)  

    The Chair: Okay, Mr. Johnston. When you look at the report, you might want to look at item number four, where the committee has expressed its concern at the lack of action in response to the letter they sent quite some time ago. I think you'll find this report very strongly makes the issue that they expected a response long ago, and now that they were getting close to issuing a report, it should at least wait until then.

    I think the subcommittee shares your concerns.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: I'm glad to hear it, Madam Chair. I think it's extremely important. If we're going to have a process with any legitimacy whatsoever in our committee work, we have to be taken seriously. If we're not, I'm sure my colleagues and I can find some other activity that will serve our constituents a lot better, rather than doing work that's not being given any attention. At least it appears that the minister has completely usurped the work of the committees.

    The Chair: I think in this one you're going to see it goes far beyond. It's a fairly comprehensive report. I think we all look forward to a very comprehensive response from the minister on an issue that I think is very critical.

    Ms. Davies.

    Ms. Libby Davies: I'm following up on the same point, because I think you made the point very well.

    Would the chair normally send a covering letter with the report? If so, in the covering letter delivering the report, is there some way you could emphasize our extreme concern and displeasure? All this work is being done. It really makes it very inconsequential if the minister decides to come out with her own thing and undercut what the committee is doing. Could it be emphasized in a letter?

    The Chair: There is no provision at the tabling. We certainly could do something under separate cover in a letter.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Okay. I would like to move it.

    The Chair: We don't have a quorum to move it. It's something you may raise with the subcommittee. I'm certain that as a subcommittee you might want to do it. I certainly will prepare a letter that I can share with you too.

    Ms. Libby Davies: Is it possible you could do it as the chair if there's a consensus here?

    The Chair: I will draft something to bring to you on Tuesday. It will be well before the tabling of the report. We can discuss it then.

[Translation]

    Ms. Monique Guay: Madam Chair, we should have a press release on this. I think it is abominable that we work so hard in these committees, that we are so committed, we produce reports, we strive for unanimous agreement, and the end result is that we get the rug pulled out from under us. If you write a letter on Tuesday, perhaps it should be followed by a press release. If not, I don't know what the committees are good for, Madam Chair.

[English]

    The Chair: Certainly it's my understanding that at the subcommittee Ms. Bennett is preparing to have a press release on it. I think it's more appropriate that she do it, since she is more familiar with all of the documentation. I suspect it will be a forceful press conference.

    Mr. Johnston.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: Madam Chair, the researcher has quite rightly pointed out that the committee report does go well beyond what the minister has stated here, and I agree. I concur with that.

    My point is this. Since these 106,000 letters have gone out, my colleagues and I have had people come into our offices and reduce the staff to tears because their case was so pathetic. You don't have to be a genius to realize that these people have severe and prolonged disabilities that absolutely would not allow them to do any kind of work. They have been reassessed, their numbers have been pulled out, and they got one of these 106,000 letters.

    My point is that if this directive from the minister was going to be coming, why wasn't it coming a year ago, rather than two days prior to when the report was sent out?

  (1250)  

    The Chair: I don't think anyone disagrees with you.

    Mr. Dale Johnston: I don't think I can state that in too forceful a way, madam Chair.

    The Chair: I think you have, Mr. Johnston.

    Seeing nothing further, I'm adjourning the meeting. Thank you.