[Translation]
Thank you. I am the senior vice-president with the workforce and workplace renewal sector.
[English]
Before we get started, I would like to give you some context for the discussion, because I know you're particularly interested in certain issues. I think it's important for me to point out that all of our work in the management of human resources in the public service is really shaped by the new regime that we have under the Public Service Modernization Act, brought into force in 2003.
So what does that really mean? It means that deputy heads of all of our departments and agencies, and their line managers, really have the primary responsibility for managing their people, as it relates to their business. So there's been a real shift in ownership and responsibility through that regime coming into force. This includes responsibility for things like recruitment, staffing, employment equity, and official languages. There's a lot they are responsible for and need to have visibility on in order to address issues where there may be problems.
The role of the Canada Public Service Agency, a central agency, is to guide and support with broad policy and direction, and then to monitor federal departments as they fulfill their responsibilities in managing their people. This is a very, very important role, because the federal public service is the largest and most complex enterprise and employer in Canada.
[Translation]
Our work is also shaped by the increasingly complex and interconnected world we live in. As you know, the public service, like all other employers, is facing a number of demographic challenges and a highly competitive labour market.
[English]
These pressures have led the Clerk of the Privy Council, Mr. Kevin Lynch, who is also the head of the public service, to make renewal a top priority.
We recognize that people entering the workforce today are seeking rewarding professional experiences, not just jobs for life. We're trying to look at things like interchanges, mid-career hiring, and more diversity and better succession planning in the public service.
I will tell you just briefly about the four priorities of renewal, because they're going to be key to me in answering questions you have about specific topics.
The first one is integrated planning.
[Translation]
We believe integrated planning to be of the utmost importance. It is, essentially, the foundation of successful human resources management.
[English]
Simply put, this is really about bringing the business lines of an organization together with the needs for people, and really thinking about that and planning it well. When you do that, you're able to do better recruitment strategies and better employment development.
The second priority of renewal is recruitment.
[Translation]
Recruitment is about ensuring that we renew and sustain capacity at all levels, and that we continue attracting people to the public service at all levels.
[English]
The third priority is employee development. This is a commitment to fostering leadership at all levels and ensuring that employees have meaningful work to do in a supportive environment.
Our last priority is called enabling infrastructure. That means we are working hard to put the right systems and processes in place to ensure that the planning and recruitment and development I talked about can happen effectively.
What I have just described is the context we operate in, our playing field, if you will, but we are really in an ever-changing environment, where deputy heads have substantial responsibility to manage their people.
I would now like to speak a little more in-depth about the issues you have identified after hearing from some other witnesses before your committee.
The topic of employee turnover has really struck you as something you want to dig deeper into. This is a complex area, and we know, for example, that some of the trends that have been identified by the Public Service Commission and others really tell us that we need to do more analysis and pay more attention to these questions. As the president of the Public Service Commission, Maria Barrados, said when she appeared before this committee last fall, the data used by her organization on employee turnover is “rather rough”, and work is under way to clarify and standardize the terminology of mobility, turnover, and temporary workforce—or these types of titles.
Our understanding of the data used by the Public Service Commission is that it encompasses all staffing transactions. Those include the hiring of new employees; reclassifications; lateral movements, meaning movement at the same level without a promotion; promotions; acting appointments; and changes in tenure.
[Translation]
We have data in the agency that captures what we call internal mobility, by which we mean lateral movements and promotions.
[English]
The Public Service Commission has identified a certain trend, and we agree that the trend lines are the same, but perhaps not to the same extent, because of course we're measuring a slightly different basket of things when we talk about internal movement. It is also very important to note that the current movement of employees in the public service is no higher today than it was in the 1990s. To be sure, more research and analysis is needed to get a better understanding of this situation.
We know that some internal movement can be healthy for a department, when that movement is the result of effective HR planning, which must focus on both the business needs of a department and employee development.
[Translation]
As I mentioned earlier, integrated business and human resources planning is the responsibility of deputy heads and their departments.
[English]
One aspect of such planning involves looking at an organization's need for employees with very specialized skills and experience, and the right proportion of generalist employees with a wider range of experience.
This reality, together with the personal preferences and career aspirations of individual employees, will have an impact on internal mobility within that organization.
[Translation]
Ongoing, effective performance management, and discussions about learning and career planning between employees and their managers are critical to managing as much of the mobility in our system as possible. There is still much work to be done in this regard.
[English]
We also know that the increase in the number of public servants who are retiring is creating opportunities for promotion, or development, for other employees. One retirement might result in several promotions or deployments, as the employee who retires must be replaced and, in turn, that person must also be replaced. Effective succession planning is key to managing those kinds of situations.
Other internal movements are necessary to support the implementation of other government policies related to the management of the public service workforce.
[Translation]
For example, employees may be temporarily out of their positions to obtain training in their second official language or to fulfil their obligations as reservists. Bill C-40 was introduced in the House of Commons this week, to strengthen job protection for reservists when they are on leave from their civilian jobs.
[English]
People may also be on temporary leave to raise children through the use of maternity, parental, adoption, or care and nurturing leave; to care for elderly parents; to pursue their education; or to take a self-funded sabbatical leave.
In all of the above examples, temporary staffing solutions are needed to ensure that the work of the employee on leave continues. This can provide other employees with developmental opportunities through acting appointments, for example; or it might allow the organization to bring in a term employee for a short period of time; or perhaps a student is hired to backfill for that employee. Another option could be to bring in a casual worker, or the work might best be completed by an employee on a pre-retirement special assignment. All of these are valid options if the department has considered the implications of their use through effective planning related to its business needs.
I should also mention that planned movement is the result of a few specific and small centrally run management development programs, where participants are assigned particular assignments, perhaps for a shorter period of time, to learn particular skills and to get certain kinds of experience. Because they're on a special program they've been selected for, they may move through the system a little bit faster in a series of assignments.
Some departments have established similar development programs to respond to their specific needs. These programs typically meet employment equity objectives very well and help make the public service more representative of the Canadian population. They do that because they're very explicit in the planning of those objectives.
[Translation]
Of course, planning cannot be perfect. What may have started out as an employee's temporary absence from work may become permanent, resulting in the need to staff the position permanently. In other instances, where internal movement is not planned, or where it is causing gaps or shortages, it may be a symptom to help us diagnose and deal with a more pressing problem, such as an area of skills shortage in the public service. This would appear to be the case with the human resources community.
The agency and the HR community are showing leadership in this respect through collective recruitment processes that all departments can access to fill vacancies and replace retiring employees.
[English]
The public service is also working to strengthen particular functional communities with explicit strategies for capacity-building, training, and professional and career development within these specialized streams.
What is clear to us at this stage is that further research and analysis are needed to understand in greater depth the different reasons behind movement of employees, both within and between departments. Through our ongoing efforts to renew and modernize the public service, I can tell you that we are giving this considerable attention.
In closing, I would like to emphasize that the public service, with the agency's support, is taking important steps to renew and sustain itself. The leadership across this system is focused on dealing with realities around demographics, increasingly complex work, and the good people management needed to achieve a high-performing and sustainable public service.
Managing the internal movement of employees needs to be addressed as part of our work on the fundamentals of renewal, including planning, recruitment, employee development, and simplifying the HR infrastructure.
This concludes my opening remarks.
[Translation]
I would now be pleased to take your questions.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
:
You've raised some really important points.
The first thing I'd say about our turnover rates, as I've said already, is that our data show they are no higher than they were in the nineties in terms of the trend. So the trend is real.
As you say, there can be different kinds of expectations, and people are always looking to develop their careers and themselves, which we have to be very, very conscious of when we're trying to help people manage their careers.
You can have a variety of people with different types of backgrounds. You can have people who are highly specialized and who can spend an entire career in one department and find a career path there to move up and advance. And that has to be part of their experience, working with good managers who look at the business needs and at that person's aspirations; and if there's a real ongoing dialogue and engagement about that, one would hope the person would feel there is a path for them and that there could be movement.
So I go back to the basic point: is every employee being managed well by a supervisor who's thinking about the very things you've pointed out, about what people may want in terms of their own path? So the basics have to be done well.
The second thing is that you've talked about there being a lot of movement. And in particular categories of jobs, where you will often have more generalist or transferable skills that are going to be in high demand between departments—and also in the private sector—we really have to look at good strategies. For example, some of the groups that are in high demand are the human resource professionals, the communications professionals, and the finance professionals. As you can appreciate, there is a lot of need for those skills in the public service, as well as outside. When you have groups that are in high demand and we're not necessarily getting enough graduates at the same time to get them experience and to have them replaced, there is going to be lots of pressure for those people to move around the system, because people have a great demand for them.
What we've been doing, for example, with the HR community—and Finance has also been working on this—is to say, okay, this community has a lot of pressure on it. How do we actually work with this community to develop capacity, such as specific training that will get these people ready at the right level and give them a career path, and manage them as a community, so they have a sense that their careers are going to be helped through the system even though they're under pressure?
The point is that you always have to have a balance between operational business needs, trying to get someone in to do that job, and also making sure employees are going to succeed over time. You need to spend enough time at a level to get good at that level and to be able to serve the public, or the internal client you have in government. I always say that's why that discussion is so important. You can say to an employee, it's probably a good idea to spend a couple of years at this level before you move up. And if you're working with them closely, that path can be a good, productive path for them, and they'll see a way ahead. It doesn't mean we don't have cases where there will be an opportunity for someone to get a promotion faster. Do you know what I mean? And that will be of interest to them.
But I go back to the fact that these are realities. We have to manage them and to focus on them and really work one-on-one—every manager and employee—to really find out how to manage movement within the public service. What's the best mix?
All I would say is that I like to see people equipped to succeed, so I like them to build depth and credibility at level. And that can vary from case to case, but as long as it's part of a really good performance management dialogue and career development dialogue, I think we'll get better and better at it.
I'll go on to the next question.
I'm actually looking for a breakdown in four or five areas. Let me just preface my remarks by saying that the turnover we experience in our public sector blows me away. I just cannot imagine how a government can function with the turnover rate we have. From all of our levels of management trying to deliver a job to all of the people in any position trying to fulfill their responsibilities, with the dramatic turnover we have, I literally cannot imagine how poorly run we are or how inefficient we are with this kind of a turnover rate.
I'm seeing the rate at basically around 40% now. Last year it was 35%; the year before that it was 30%; the year before that it was 23%; the year before that it was 18%. My point is that we're not heading in the right direction.
When I see this kind of turnover, I have two areas of concern. I want a comparison to another sector, and I'll get to that.
In terms of all of these transfers taking place, I'll give you four categories. I'm certainly not asking you to come up with numbers, but eventually I'd like some information on this from the department. In terms of all these transfers that are taking place, or the massive turnover, what percentage is the result of retirement, what percentage would be advancement, what percentage would be as a result of all the temporary conditions you've listed—maternity, reservists, etc.—and what percentage would be simply a request for relocation?
If we are able to separate those four components right there, it would give us a little better understanding. Obviously we have one other internal problem that it could be, which is just total job dissatisfaction. I'm hoping that is the smallest category, but if it turned out to be one of the major categories, then we really have some problems.
At some point, I'd like a report back to this committee with some range of discussion on that.
One other point I would like to make is that we found the turnover rate is much smaller in a lot of the smaller communities where we have federal employees than it is in larger urban cores. Why? We need to know why. Does that mean we should take a lot of our federal responsibilities that have accumulated in large urban cores and start to spread them to smaller communities? Is that the solution? I'm not suggesting it is, but if there's a correlation between the low turnover rate in your smaller communities versus your massive, “bloated” bureaucracy, then we have another problem.
I would like your comment on that.
:
We'll start with your request for a breakdown, which our statistical expert here says we can provide as a follow-up. We can give you a good breakdown on the various categories. We may even have one or two more.
I don't know that we'd have one on job dissatisfaction, but I take your point that part of good management is trying to make sure people have meaningful work and want to stay for a reasonable amount of time.
With reference to the smaller communities, yes, I believe our numbers do indicate that there is more movement in the national capital area than there are in regions. I don't know that we have a lot of analysis as to why, but in the national capital region one of the reasons for a lot of movement is that we tend to have quite a few of the five largest professional occupational groups in which there's a lot of movement. Human resources, as I mentioned, is constantly moving. The economists and the executives move a lot; that movement is often associated with some career progression and planning. We also have some development programs for executives that would require movement to get them developed to a certain level. The computer scientists often move a lot in this area, and also program managers.
Why do they move a lot? It's because they have more of the generalist or corporate services skills that are in high demand. Those skills are highly transferable between branches in a department, or in fact between departments. It's also because we have, as I said, some basic shortages in the labour market in those areas, so it is going to be more challenging to keep people for a long period of time in some of those areas because there will be opportunities for them to advance and move as a result of the high demand for them.
Because there's a higher population of those folks in the NCR, it's logical that there would be more movement compared to the regions. Often departments will have a lot of their central administration in the national capital region, so those groups naturally would gravitate there.
I don't have information in greater depth as to why people stay longer in the regions. When it comes to issues of relocation, there can be a lot of personal and family reasons as well; people have different reasons and different considerations in every case, in terms of what part of the country they want to work in.
I do agree that diversity of thinking and representation across Canada is really important. When we manage and try to build our teams, we need to really plan for and think about getting a good mix of not only people, backgrounds, education, and employment equity groups, but also of regions of Canada, and build diversity into our thinking, because we make better policies and deliver better service that way.
:
I'm sure it's something they would have to consider when they do their overall planning.
I keep coming back to planning. Frankly, since I've been working in this job, I'm realizing how critical it is to good management and to dealing with all kinds of questions, including the one you ask.
In terms of planning for a department, when a deputy head is leading that process, the first level is that really strategic level--for example, what the business of that particular department is, what the main business lines are, what the needs are that spread across Canada, etc. Then what they really have to do is cascade that down so that every sub-leader.... I would be the next level, the assistant deputy minister. If I'm running old age security or whatever, I have to really do that in depth for my own, and I expect everyone who's underneath me to feed in, so that I can give a really good picture of my business, my people needs, my finance, and everything else. That has to actually form that overall integrated plan for a department.
The bottom line here is that the questions you're asking are big questions for a department that they need to engage in. I'll be very honest with you: integrated planning is evolving and getting better with time, but most departments and deputies who find they're doing it well now have told us that it's taken two to three years of changing the energy and the dialogue in the department to get into planning and that type of open conversation that brings the people piece in, and that when they've spent two to three years really doing it, they start to see excellent results.
I'll give you an example. I can't speak to HRSD, but a few years ago the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, as you know, with food safety becoming a big issue in Canada, got lots of new funding in their budget to deal with big national issues of importance. Their deputy shared the fact that a whole lot of new expectations were put on the department with that. They needed to sit down right away and start talking about what this set of new business needs would mean and how they were going to recruit the people they needed. They needed to look at scientific recruitment--which is challenging in and of itself--and something they called a hyperspecialist, a situation in which there might be one expert in North America to do that type of science.
For me, it was a live example of a management team taking ownership of the business it needed to do for Canadians and then really figuring out what the people stuff was.
I'm just saying that you have to have that kind of dynamic. The deputy has to have a plan, and that plan has to be shared with employees.
:
I talked about renewal. Our clerk is really leading deputies, and really expecting much better work year over year on truly holistic planning that looks at all the angles. It would have to include those kinds of considerations. When you have a department with a lot of regional operations, they should be looking at—and I'm sure they do look at— the mix and where they do training.
Something I've noticed about the movement of people—and I've been in eight or nine departments, so this is based on my own experience—is that many people, when they move, usually move largely within the same department, and then there is a certain proportion of movement between departments, so in terms of the investment that's made.... That's why I'm so keen on real discussion around employee development in every work unit, because you help people plan how to invest.
We invest in somebody's training and learning a job. We'd like them to make that contribution for a decent amount of time, and then if they move on to another part of the organization, they're still with us, and their skills and investment are still giving us something good in the system.
We do have movement, but a lot of movement is within the same department; some movement is between departments. You still have trained and formed people to be able to produce good work for the public service. As I said, our departure rate overall is lower than that in the private sector. We actually have quite a high level of retention in the public service.
I would also emphasize that we're aware of the challenges, but I wouldn't say we're in a crisis. This is serious. These are trends we have to pay attention to. What we work on in the agency, which is what the clerk is pushing people to do, is to say, this isn't simply the job of the human resources department anymore; this is your job, line manager. This is your job to take ownership of these questions, and to be paying attention to them, and to be managing them. To have a high-performing public service, you have to make sure you're getting the best out of people, and that they feel they have a career path.
There are two sides, and people have to have the discussion. The worst thing is if you're not having that dialogue and discussion, and somebody feels they're not being utilized fully, and they're dissatisfied and may move on. We still, hopefully, will get them somewhere else in the system, but I go back to that “six-pack”— the good leadership, the good management, the career development. These are the basics. We need to just keep making sure they become more and more systematic through the system.
In my case, I've had good people who have managed me through my career and have helped me figure out what to do, but I've also spent good amounts of time in each place so that I could build my strength as I went. So I'm very grateful for my own experience, and I think there are many who have good experience, and others for whom we need to do better. This is really person-to-person good management. This is how you do it.
I'm sitting in for someone, but it is a very interesting topic.
We're sometimes confused as to how far some of these policies go into arm's-length agencies. To be more specific, I represent Nunavut, and we have land claims agreements that have specific requirements concerning Inuit hiring. Sometimes there doesn't seem to be a clear policy on how far those policies go, whether it's Parks Canada or Canada Post, for example. The more arm's-length you go from the central part, the more it seems to be a selective or optional interpretation of what that means at the hiring level.
We're aiming for proportional hiring with the Inuit population in our territory, but we sometimes have difficulty with some federal government departments that say that policy doesn't apply to them because they're, let's say, Canada Post, and they're arm's-length, or Parks Canada has its own guidelines.
So I think there needs to be a clearer policy on what you mean by government departments. Are they part of the central group, so that policy applies to them? Yes? What is the policy for Parks Canada, Canada Post, or some of the other agencies that are up there, as we set up more agencies that seem to be a little bit arm's-length?
As far as people up there are concerned, the agencies are still the Government of Canada, but when it comes down to the nitty-gritty, sometimes it's a very grey area and it's different for each agency. Again, there seems to be selective interpretation.
This is very specific, and I don't mind if you get to back to me later.
Here is another very quick point. I noticed in the information that the Canadian Human Rights Commission ensures equal opportunity for employment of the four designated groups. I'm assuming you have hiring priority policies for those groups. Do you get any complaints when you have hiring priority policies like affirmative action?
:
I'll tell you what I do know about the special operating agencies and crown corporations, versus the 70 or so departments and agencies that our policies would cover, and my staff will correct me if I'm wrong. We can certainly provide a follow-up page to the committee.
But you're quite right, things like Canada Post...that's a crown corporation, so it really is governed in and of itself, and our policies would not apply to them. Many of them will have similar things, but they really do run on their own.
You have something like the Canada Revenue Agency, which is a special operating agency. It's still part of the Government of Canada, but it's been set up with a different kind of governance.
I won't get technical, but under a certain schedule of the Financial Administration Act, there's a whole list of departments and agencies that are considered to be part of the employer of the Government of Canada, and run by the Treasury Board as the employer. That's the group to which our policies would apply as the general policies. They have to work with those policies and set up their own processes to support them inside, but our policies would apply to that large group.
We can follow up for you there, but you're quite right, there are some differences.
Just to be clear, any complaints about human rights—whether that has to do with employment equity groups or any of the grounds under the Human Rights Act—those would go to the Canadian Human Rights Commission and not the agency. We do not receive those complaints.
However, in my area, I am responsible for the policy on employment equity for the public service—that large group of departments—as well as for the duty to accommodate, both of which are related in some ways and very, very important, especially in today's increasingly diverse workforce. We do that general policy, we provide some support and guidance, and we monitor departmental performance, but the departments are responsible for their results on how they are doing effective hiring of equity groups, as well as all kinds of other considerations in their recruitment.
So as a public service overall, we are meeting the workforce availability for persons with disabilities, for women, and for aboriginal people. We do not yet meet—well enough—the workforce availability for visible minorities. I did a couple of committees in the last week, talking about some of those issues.
But the bottom line is that we have to look to deputy heads—starting with the planning, and then how do they do their recruiting—to try to make sure they can build their workforce to be representative. One thing I would emphasize is that we've seen that when people do really thoughtful planning, they get very, very good results on the employment equity groups. Some of our percentages on those centrally run management trainee programs are fantastic.
My point is that when you think about it, plan for it, and seek out that talent, you can build a very good representative work unit. I guess what I'm saying is that we just have to keep working on that year after year.
:
Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for your presentation, Ms. Ellis.
All of this brings back memories of the 1990s. I myself am a former public servant. I am not sure whether you recall, but at that time the talk was of salary freezing. This meant that the only way for a young employee to earn more was to change jobs. I worked for a number of different departments in a number of different capacities and eventually ended up drafting memoranda of understanding between various departments. I was also involved in union-management negotiations. In short, I had a great career.
I sought out jobs in the IT field. What led me to leave the public service was not that there was not enough work, but, rather, primarily, the lack of challenge or recognition. That being said, it would be remiss of me not to mention the grievances of certain colleagues who provided us with unsurpassed support even though their workload was too heavy. For some managers, when it came to setting priorities, their career came first, end of story, and their employees were an afterthought.
At the beginning of last week, we heard from public service union representatives who explained to us the salary discrepancies that affect people working in compensation services.
The same problem existed when I was a public servant, and I remember that other employees did all that they could to help us, because we all worked together. Everybody wants to be paid, and to be paid on time, and everybody wants information; however, the compensation officers have too much work on their plate and, to be honest with you, I have never had the impression that their problem is a priority for the department.
I appreciate that each department has its own challenges. Priorities and services vary from one department to the next. Some are more political, others are more operational. In addition, some departments are going through restructuring. I saw a lot of restructuring in my time, it was awful. The department changed its name three times in two years.
There comes a point when the employees seem to become demotivated. You are trying to create the impression that everything is going swimmingly, when that is not in fact the case in all departments. It would perhaps be better to recognize that there is a problem and try to find the solution.
That is why we are so interested in planning. That is what we are looking for as a committee. There is a problem, and we want to know how you are addressing it.
I have also worked in management. Managers want the best from their employees. I will always remember something that my last employer said to me. He said that his aim was to see me promoted above him. That is what happened and we celebrated. That is something that you do not see in the public service.
I am going to ask you to explain something in simple terms for us. The various departments are in competition with one another. Some departments offer higher salaries than others for equivalent work. This is something that I experienced in the 1990s. Departments tried to grab the best employees and sometimes offer better conditions to certain employees in order to keep them.
On Tuesday, we heard that these salary discrepancies can be as much as $14,000. The public service is a small world; people talk to one another and word gets out. This sort of situation undermines morale and could also lead to people asking themselves whether it is worth staying with the public service. I can well believe that there are cases of $14,000 salary discrepancies. The people who told us about them had proof. Are you aware of this problem?
To cut to the chase, what do you plan on doing to resolve this problem? Are you carrying out more detailed investigations in some areas? Do you carry out investigations or audits in those departments where there are problems?
As the witnesses said on Tuesday, this sort of problem does not affect all departments. It does, however, seem to affect more operational services, such as, for example, Service Canada. When I was a public servant, I remember Service Canada employees saying that they had to handle a crazy amount of legislation. How can they be expected to provide customer service in such conditions? Service Canada struggled to recruit staff as employees were disheartened at having to interpret five, six or even seven pieces of legislation, including the Immigration Act. They knew that the information they were giving could have important consequences for the person who was requesting it.
Perhaps you would like to comment on this situation. I went through it myself in the 1990s, and a decade later the same problem still exists.
In a region like northern Ontario, we take our federal or provincial civil service jobs very seriously. As would attest, if you lose civil service jobs in your riding, you're pretty much out of a job in the next election, because it's a very serious issue.
We see a trend. You can see this provincially. A number of political parties over the years in Ontario have run campaigns in northern Ontario on promising to move civil service jobs to northern Ontario—“elect us and we're going to move a big department”—and it never happens. Its just doesn't happen. As soon as the government comes in, they realize that there's such an entrenched way of doing things that it just doesn't happen.
Then when you see a downturn and civil servants are let go, it really is a case of the empire striking back. The first places that lose the jobs, it seems, are always the regions, and jobs are sucked back to the centre.
My concern here is ensuring the fair distribution of geographical locations, number one, because it is a fundamental issue of fairness and accessibility for all Canadians, and number two, because it makes economic sense, because these are jobs with low turnovers and high commitments.
Yet the way the departments are working now, deputy ministers have substantial authority. Under the changes to the Public Service Employment Act, managers have much higher, greater powers to hire.
It seems to me that the decision to actually locate work outside of the great empire is a political decision. It needs political will. It doesn't just happen because the deputy manager wakes up one day and says, you know what, I think we should make sure Lethbridge is well accounted for. It just doesn't seem that works in the corporate structure.
Given that so much responsibility has been given to such a great extent to deputy ministers—and I'm not saying that's a bad thing—and that there doesn't seem to be any mechanism in place to ensure geographic fairness in the allocation of jobs, how do we do that?