Expect more cuts to the public service in the coming weeks, says Gary Corbett, president of the Public Institute of the Public Service of Canada, as his union gears up for what they believe to be heavy job losses coming down the line in the 2012 budget. 

“There are more cuts coming, I can tell you that,” said Mr. Corbett. “I’m expecting something in the next days to weeks.”

He was tight-lipped with details stating, “there’s people concerned here” and he would wait for employees to be notified before discussing further job losses in the press.  

Any cuts would likely be due to the 2010 strategic review, where departments were asked to find its worst-performing or lowest-priority programs, for a total of five per cent of program spending. The money was then moved from those programs to higher-priority ones. 

Every government organization participated in the strategic review from 2007 to 2010. The effects of the 2010 review were felt last year, with more than 2,000 jobs cut across 12 departments agencies.

Currently, PIPSC and the Public Service Alliance of Canada, who represent more than 200,000 federal bureaucrats between them, are busy preparing for the effects of the government’s latest savings initiative, the strategic and operating review, also known as the deficit reduction action plan. 

“They’re worried and they’re waiting for the Government of Canada to decide their fate. They’re waiting for Cabinet and they’re waiting for the budget,” said Mr. Corbett.

The government is aiming to find at least $4-billion, or five per cent, in ongoing savings from the public service’s $80-billion direct program spending budget. Departments have been asked to submit proposals for both five and 10 per cent cuts, though there has been recent speculation that some departments could be cut by more than that.

“We’ve moved into preparing for workforce adjustments, preparing packages for members so they know where they can go, and for our stewards to help members in the workplace,” said Mr. Corbett.

Mr. Corbett said his union has also been working with the Canada School of Public Service and Treasury Board Secretariat to prepare, and to educate senior managers about how to handle members of their workforce who have been cut. 

“They’re basically setting up for what’s going to be drastic changes in the federal public service, probably this will be the biggest change since program review, if not bigger,” he said.

PSAC is also working on its response to the cuts, and putting out information for its members said the president of its agriculture union, Bob Kingston.  

“We’re in the process of establishing workforce adjustment committees with most departments at both national and regional levels,” he said. 

The committees manage staff that have been laid off by connecting them with support services and helping them find openings in other areas of a department, among other things.

Mr. Kingston said that from what he’s heard from union members right now, “the general consensus is 10 per cent across the board” will be the result on budget day.

There was speculation as early as last summer that the cuts could amount to up to 30,000 lost public service jobs, but PSAC president John Gordon said not to put too much stock into the figure.

“No one has ever come up with a number of jobs that were going to be cut,” he said.

He added that the public service’s attrition rate would likely amount to around 40,000 people retiring or leaving the public service of their own will over the next four years, so the 30,000 figure could relate to those departures.

Treasury Board President Tony Clement (Parry Sound-Muskoka, Ont.) and Finance Minister Jim Flaherty (Whitby-Oshawa, Ont.) have both said recently that the government has not made any decisions.

Mr. Flaherty also said recently that the cuts would not be “a broad brush across the government of everybody gets a five per cent reduction or everybody gets a 10 per cent reduction.”

The decisions on what to cut are up to Cabinet’s Treasury Board sub-committee on the strategic and operating review, chaired by Mr. Clement and made up of nine ministers.

Mr. Kingston said that 10 per cent cuts could cripple departments.

“A lot of departments are already at the stage where to cut further would make them incompetent in terms of delivery. That pretty much sets them up for dismantling of devolution into another sector or privatization. A lot of cynical people in government have suspected that that’s been the Harper government’s objective for a long time,” he said.

With the upcoming cuts, the public service is also at risk of another demographic and knowledge gap like the one created by program review in 1995. To manage Canada’s debt, the Liberal government cut 45,000 jobs. The cuts amounted to a lost generation of public servants that is still being felt today as the civil service looks for its next generation of leaders. 

“There’s not enough foresight about what this is going to do to the public service 15 years down the road. Nor do I think that this particular government cares,” said Mr. Corbett.

As the public service waits to see where the cuts will come, the Senate has completed a review of its own spending and found places for efficiencies, according to Saskatchewan Senator David Tkachuck, the Conservative chair of the Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration Committee.

Parliament is separate from the civil service, and so was not obligated to find savings under the strategic and operating review, but the House, Senate and Library of Parliament are all examining their budgets to find savings.

Like the civil service, the Senate was looking to save five to 10 per cent of its budget. In 2010-2011, the Upper Chamber spent $88.3-million, according to the public accounts. A five to 10 per cent cut would amount to $4.4-million to $8.8-million in savings.

Sen. Tkachuk said that the Senate met its target, but declined to give many details about how much money was saved, or how, because the figures had not yet been reported to the Senate.

He did say that the savings were found “all over the place” and that in some areas, the group ended up cutting eight or nine per cent in order to achieve a net savings of at least five per cent.

The committee’s report has already been drafted and will likely be tabled in February, he said. The group had been working with Senate administration, including the Clerk and directors, since last summer, said Sen. Tkachuk.  

In an earlier interview, Sen. Tkachuk said that the results of the Senate’s savings measures would be listed in the main estimates and realized over three years.

The House’s look at its own books is being helmed by the Board of Internal Economy. NDP MP Joe Comartin (Windsor-Tecumseh, Ont.), the Board’s opposition spokesperson, told The Hill Times recently that it’s unlikely that their spending review would be ready for the 2012 main estimates. 

The House is also looking for a five to 10 per cent reduction in spending. The House spent $424.2-million in 2010-2011, according to the public accounts. A five per cent cut would be $21.1-million. 

MPs pensions are a place the government may now be looking for savings, according to reports. Mr. Clement indicated he would look at Parliamentarian’s pension benefits last week after the Canadian Taxpayers Federation released a report stating that for every dollar an MP contributes to the plan, Canadians contribute $23. The CTF has also called for public service pensions to be cut.

Mr. Gordon said that he had the opportunity to ask Mr. Flaherty directly whether or not public service pensions would be facing cuts in a fall 2010 meeting. The union and government had recently came to an agreement to raise workers’ contributions to the pension fund to 40 per cent, while the government contributed 60 per cent. The contribution rate comes into full effect in 2013.

At the time, Mr. Flaherty said that he was satisfied with the pensions, according to Mr. Gordon.

“Now I’m hearing different signals, and I quite frankly am at a loss. Why won’t they come clean and tell us, if they’re doing something, what it is they’re doing?” said Mr. Gordon. 

With the budget expected any time in the two coming months, public servants are “worried and they’re waiting for the government of Canada to decide their fate,” said Mr. Corbett.

The fallout from the strategic and operating review will be “dire,” Mr. Kingston said.

“Every large organization is going to have a pocket here or there where for whatever reason people have it relatively better than others, but by and large most federal offices are run off their feet these days, and the people making these decisions I don’t think are cognizant of that,” he said. 

jbruno@hilltimes.com

The Hill Times