44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 9, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, I think it is important to take a brief look at the summary of Bill C-290. It proposes to expand the protections of the PSDPA to additional categories of public servants, permit that a protected disclosure be made to any supervisor, add a duty to provide support to whistle-blowers and repeal sections of the act that prevent overlap with other recourse mechanisms and provisions that set out the standard of serious wrongdoings.
I want to highlight for members the importance of whistle-blower legislation. I had an opportunity here in Ottawa in the past and in the Manitoba legislature to talk about the importance of enabling whistle-blowing and enhancing legislation where we can. We know that the government has been working with stakeholders regarding how we can improve legislation, which is a process that has been under way for a while now. I do not necessarily know all of the details of it, but I do know how important it is that we recognize this particular process and, at the very least, acknowledge those who have put in so much effort to bring us to the point where we are today.
The legislation we are talking about, I would suggest, has a number of concerns within it. At the very least, if the legislation were to go to the next stage, no doubt it would require a number of amendments.
Our civil service puts in a phenomenal effort in many different respects. It was not that long ago that we turned to our civil servants and said, when going into the pandemic, that we needed to ensure we could develop the types of programs that would be there for Canadians. I want to acknowledge the types of efforts that were put in, and then at the tail end, I will talk about why it is important that we have whistle-blower legislation at the provincial and national levels. I will start by giving credit where credit is due.
When we went into the pandemic, there was no such thing as a CERB payment or a program that would provide hundreds of millions going into billions of dollars to Canadians. Virtually from ground zero, civil servants stepped up on a program of that nature. Earlier today, we talked at great length about the wage subsidy program. Again, it was civil servants who stepped up to provide that program. In general, the vast majority of things that take place within our civil service support Canadians seven days a week, 24 hours a day.
If one wanted to illustrate how effective our civil servants were, and still are obviously, in the creation of the programs I just referenced, we can put it into perspective: Nine million-plus Canadians received benefits, and none of that would have been possible if not for our civil service. It provided the financial resources that were necessary for people to sustain themselves. We can talk about the tens of thousands of businesses, some of which were highlighted earlier today and the CRA will follow through on, that benefited from the efforts of civil servants providing the programs and processes necessary to sustain companies and protect jobs so that Canada would be in a much better position.
The speaker before me on this legislation made reference to the issue of immigration. We have civil servants around the world who are there every day to ensure that we continue to grow and prosper as a nation through immigration policies. As immigration grows, the demands on those civil servants continue to grow and we provide the finances.
It is not all perfect, as we know. There are ways in which we can look at improving the system. I want to relay some statistics in regard to issues. For example, from 2007-08 to 2021-22, there were 161 internal disclosures that led to a finding of wrongdoing and 443 internal disclosures that led ultimately to corrective measures. PSIC had 17 cases that led to a finding of wrongdoing and corrective measures, along with two cases that led to corrective measures without finding any wrongdoing. In fact, eight cases were referred to the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Tribunal. There have been no findings of reprisal. I think that is really important.
This is the reason why we look at whistle-blower legislation and how we can improve upon the civil service. This is how I ultimately view it: How do we enhance what we already have as a world-class civil service? One of the ways we do that is by protecting those civil servants who are put into positions where there is a moral obligation or, at times, some form of quasi-legal aspect of having to report on something, so that there are no reprisals as a direct result of having to make that claim.
From 2016 to 2021-22, there were 505 reprisal complaints received by PSIC, leading to 62 investigations that were launched, with 22 of them being resolved through conciliation. I think it is important to note that data was not reported from 2007-08 and 2015. Over the last five years, the number of new allegations of wrongdoing made internally has averaged around 269 per year. Over the last five years, PSIC received an average of 145 disclosures of wrongdoing and 48 reprisal complaints.
I could go on with some of the stats, but I want to emphasize that we believe public servants who disclose serious wrongdoing must be protected. We recognize that. The Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act helps to ensure an ethical workplace culture and supports the integrity of the federal public sector.
As I started off my comments, I would like to conclude them by saying that I have witnessed first-hand, for many years as a parliamentarian, the outstanding performance of our civil servants at the national and other levels of government. Comparing Canada as a whole to other nations around the world, I think we can take a great sense of pride in it. I am glad to hear that the department itself is looking at ways in which we can even improve the system by incorporating whistle-blower legislation that will add true value to the process and protect our public servants.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to a bill that I believe is long overdue, as it addresses something that I believe is long overdue to be addressed.
Bill C-290 would amend the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act to strengthen the current whistle-blower protections for public servants. This is an excellent initiative, and I commend my colleague for introducing the bill.
As was mentioned in the sponsor of this bill’s speech, while the Public Servants Disclosure Act is based on sound principles, it has a number of flaws. The bill before us seeks to address those flaws. That is why it is important to add these stronger protections sooner rather than later. Though it would seem that the desire to swiftly deliver stronger protections for whistle-blowers only exists on the opposition side of the House.
The government, after sitting on well-written recommendations for whistle-blower protections for five years, now wants to spend millions of dollars and more time studying them. The Liberals may even decide to procure the services of some outside consulting firm to tell them what they should do. We simply cannot continue to wait for them to get their act together.
Whistle-blower protections are fundamental to the functioning of our government. If public servants are afraid to raise the alarm, then corruption and wasteful spending run rampant. In the absence of these protections, a culture of fear arises. Public servants are worried about retaliatory actions being taken if they raise their concerns over government actions.
Oftentimes, it is public servants who lead to the public discovering a government’s malfeasance. For example, at the beginning of this year, when CBC published its article detailing the McKinsey contracts, there was testimony from two IRCC employees who held major roles in the department. They spoke about the issues of contracting with McKinsey and their concerns on the condition of remaining anonymous.
If we had a system in place that would have protected them and allowed them to raise these concerns earlier, we may not be where we are now, with the government having given over $100 million in contracts to McKinsey. That is why we must ensure that the protections for whistle-blowers are strong. The bill would do many things to strengthen these protections.
Bill C-290 would expand the definition of wrongdoing. It would broaden who is considered a supervisor, so that public servants could make a protected disclosure to any superior within their organization. This would allow public servants to go to any trusted superior to voice their concerns. It would give public servants more confidence in raising concerns if they know they can go to someone they trust outside of their direct superior.
Another good change that is being proposed through the bill is the extension of the deadline for filing a reprisal complaint from 60 days to one year. Giving public servants more time to file their complaints would ensure there is ample time for reprisal actions to be identified and punished. It is important that these concerns are heard and that bad actors are dealt with, or else we may have reoffenders.
Another aspect that is addressed in the bill is the penalty for reprisal against whistle-blowers and protections for whistle-blowers themselves. The significant increases in financial penalties for reprisals would be an important deterrent for possible bad actors who are trying to punish and silence whistle-blowers. The increased penalties would likely be a strong deterrent against reprisals.
The bill would also allow for a remedy to be provided to a whistle-blower if a reprisal action was taken. This is important, as not only could the whistle-blower be vindicated if reprisal actions are taken, but they could also be compensated in some way to make up for the reprisal action and ensuing consequences. Additionally, by giving superiors a duty to protect and provide support to public servants making a disclosure, whistle-blowers could be more confident when coming forward that this would indeed happen.
One last aspect of the bill that I want to focus on is the requirement to review the act every five years. I am sure that members of the governing party will enthusiastically welcome this addition, given their eagerness just now to review the act.
Obviously, we have seen that, without proactive attention, the shortcomings of the act have been exploited. As members may recall, the Public Servants Disclosure Protection Act was brought in under the previous Conservative government in 2006. This legislation was in response to the Liberal sponsorship scandal. Over the past several years, we have seen that the current whistle-blower protections are not sufficient.
As the sponsor of this bill said in his speech, we can probably count on two hands the number of people who have actually been protected under the current framework. We must do more. With a Prime Minister and cabinet that have been found guilty of a record five ethics breaches, we need to rely on whistle-blowers more than ever to bring to light the questionable and unethical, behind-the-scenes actions of the government.
We need only recall how the Prime Minister treated his former minister of justice when she stood up for the integrity of her office. She was quickly forced out. If a minister of the Crown cannot be protected, how can we expect public servants to come forward with their concerns? This bill is the first step we can take towards strengthening whistle-blower protections. Hopefully, we can reach the point where the government will fully implement all of the recommendations put forward by the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates in 2017.
Conservatives have always been supportive of strong protections for whistle-blowers. That is why we are supporting this bill, just as we supported the 2017 recommendations from the OGGO committee then, and they were as follows: expanding the definition of the terms “wrongdoing” and “reprisal” and modifying the definition of the term “protected disclosure” under the act; amending the legislation to protect and support whistle-blowers and prevent retaliation against them; reversing the burden of proof from the whistle-blower onto the employer in cases of reprisals; providing legal and procedural advice, as necessary, to public servants seeking to make a protected disclosure of wrongdoing or file a reprisal complaint; embedding in the legislation confidentiality provisions of witnesses’ identities; making the Office of the Public Sector Integrity Commissioner responsible for training, education and oversight responsibilities to standardize the internal disclosure process; and finally, implementing mandatory and timely reporting of disclosure activities.
As my colleague, the shadow minister for Treasury Board, stated last fall:
Conservatives have a long history of standing up for whistleblowers, first with the creation of the Public Servants Disclosure Protections Act under Prime Minister Stephen Harper as well as reforms to strengthen the act included in both our 2019 and 2021 platforms. As the Liberal government fails to prioritize these important protections, we will continue our work to stand up for public servants and protect whistleblowers.
I hope that all of these recommendations will be fully implemented sooner rather than later, and I think this bill is a great start. I also hope my colleagues on the government side will support it. If they do not, we will be left to speculate as to why they do not want public servants bringing forward concerns about the government’s actions.
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Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise this evening to support this bill going to committee. Obviously, whistle-blower protection is something quite serious and important. It is one of a few ways Canadians can come to know about misbehaviour or indeed rule-breaking and unethical behaviour within the government. The fact that Canada's whistle-blower regime needs to be improved is well known.
In 2021, the International Bar Association did a survey of about 50 different countries around the world, and Canada placed dead last in its assessment of our whistle-blower protection regime, so it stands to reason that we should take that to heart. In my first Parliament, in the 42nd Parliament, there was finally a rather extensive review of the legislation under a commitment by this very government that it would improve whistle-blower legislation. This resulted in a number of recommendations that were never acted upon.
We know, and it has been acknowledged in many different fora, both internationally and here at home, that our whistle-blower protection regime is not what it should be and not, what I dare say, Canadians expect.
If we want to talk about gatekeepers, as some do in this place, one of the important ways of trying to create accountability for gatekeepers is to have the people who work under them able to confidently identify instances where they are not doing what they should be doing, where they are not working in the public interest they have sworn to work under or where their political masters are not doing that either. It becomes very important indeed that we have that kind of protection.
Of course the leader of the Conservative Party is someone who likes to talk a lot about gatekeepers and wanting to protect Canadians against them, but it was actually he, as minister in 2006, who introduced this legislation, which has been roundly panned as a terrible way of protecting whistle-blowers within the Canadian public service. Canadians should ask themselves how it is that somebody who managed to design one of the worst whistle-blower protection regimes in the world, or certainly within the 50 countries that were examined by the International Bar Association, will fare as a prime minister trying to stand up to gatekeepers.
We notice in other areas, such as when we talk about housing, for instance, that he wants to stand up against gatekeepers. He pretends that it is only municipal governments that are the problem, and that if only we could push them to approve permits faster, we would solve the housing crisis. There is no mention of the massive corporations that are making billions of dollars with the financialization of the Canadian housing market and the kinds of things we could be doing to make that less of a lucrative enterprise for these large corporations to be renovicting tenants and putting them out on the street. There is no mention of that.
There is no mention of all the gatekeeping that happens in the economy by private actors. He is only seeing one part of the problem, which is government, and sometimes government is the problem. There are government gatekeepers, but here is an example where the cabinet minister had the opportunity to do something about a problem and actually designed one of the worst systems we know of to hold gatekeepers to account. I would just remind Canadians of some of these important facts this bill reminds me of, and it may remind others in the House, on the record of the leader of the official opposition.
However, I digress. It is important also to talk about the record of the government when it comes to whistle-blowing, because at one time the Prime Minister said that he cared about that and that he was aware of the shortcomings of Canada's whistle-blowing regime. Then, not for the first time, he did not follow through on making good on commitments to improve that regime.
Here we are, and a hot topic often in the House of Commons these days, and rightly so, is the extent to which firms such as McKinsey, and I will add, and would like to see my Conservative colleagues add these more often to that list, companies such as Deloitte, KPMG and others, which have also received huge contracts from the federal government.
How would one come to know about an 80-year contract, a contract that is good to the year 2100, is not competitive and does not lock in value for Canadian taxpayers, but actually just shifts expenditure from where it should be in a well-functioning, well-trained and well-supported public service to the arena of private contractors? We would expect somebody who was given the job of administering that contract to blow the whistle, but we cannot get access to that kind of information if people are worried that they will not be properly protected when they bring those kinds of things to light.
I think some of the contemporary topics here in the House of Commons highlight the importance of being able to get good information from our public servants by offering the protection they deserve when they see, in their workplace, that their superiors in the civil service or their political masters are not behaving in the public interest and doing things that rightly ought to be examined in this place, in the media and in all the other fora that matter when we talk about a well-functioning democracy.
We might also expect, frankly, a little more respect for our public servants. We are talking about whistle-blowing today, but another important aspect ties into this question around McKinsey, Deloitte, KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers. The government, which says it really values public servants, values the work they did during the pandemic and values that going forward, is not coming to the bargaining table to bargain in good faith with the very workers it is willing to praise with words in this place. When they go back to their departmental offices and it is time for action and time to honour those words in the collective bargaining process, the government takes a pass.
PSAC members at the taxation centre in the riding I represent, Elmwood—Transcona, have been without a contract for two years now. The government will not come to the table to talk to them about the offer that workers have put on the table, so they are contemplating strike action. How does that represent the commitment to respect the civil service that the government made in 2015 when it was also talking about improving whistle-blower protection? It does not.
How dare the government plead poverty at the bargaining table and say it does not have money to pay public servants what they are worth when it is hemorrhaging money out to companies like McKinsey, Deloitte, KPMG and PricewaterhouseCoopers to do work that properly belongs within the purview of the public service. It is unreal.
This perpetual inadequacy of the whistle-blower regime is just another way that a government that says it wants to respect its workers continues to show an incredible amount of disrespect to them. There is disrespect by not allowing them to bring forward problems from the workplace with adequate protections. There is disrespect by refusing to come to the bargaining table and negotiate in good faith. There is disrespect, while doing that, to be paying billions of dollars to private consultants to do the job that public servants were hired to do. The government then says it cannot invest in the public service. Well, that is poppycock because it has the money. It is just choosing to spend it elsewhere.
I am happy to be voting to send this bill to committee, not just to improve whistle-blower protection in Canada, which is long overdue, but also as part of a larger project of manifesting respect for our public servants, who, as others have said in this place, did an incredible service to Canadians in delivering pandemic relief programs on an urgent basis. In many cases, they did that from home while trying to manage children who were not at school and spouses who were also working their various jobs. It was difficult, and a lot of them still, as we all do, bear certain scars from that experience.
What has made it worse and what is tanking morale at a time when the federal government is struggling to provide basic services is this ongoing disrespect by not showing up at the bargaining table and not giving whistle-blowers the protection they deserve. Meanwhile, we find out the government has plenty of cash to pay its friends in the private sector to do the jobs of public servants.
That is why I am quite pleased to be voting to send this to committee, where I hope the whistle-blower portion of the project will be examined in greater detail.
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