Finance and Government Services — Issue No. 116 — Monday, November 14, 2016 (HTML)

Present: Wm. Scott Hamilton, MLA (Chair); Carole James, MLA (Deputy Chair); Dan Ashton, MLA; Robin Austin, MLA; Eric Foster, MLA; Simon Gibson, MLA; George Heyman, MLA; Jennifer Rice, MLA; Jackie Tegart, MLA; John Yap, MLA

2. Pursuant to its terms of reference, the Committee continued its review of the three-year rolling service plans, annual reports and budget estimates of the statutory offices.

3. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions:

5. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions:

9. Resolved, that the Committee meet in-camera to deliberate on its draft report on the budget estimates of the Statutory Offices and on the Budget 2017 Consultations. (Dan Ashton, MLA)

12. Resolved, that the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services approve and adopt the report entitled Report on the Budget 2017 Consultations as amended today and further, that the Committee authorize the Chair and Deputy Chair to work with committee staff to finalize any minor editorial changes to complete the supporting text. (Eric Foster, MLA)

13. Resolved, that the Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services deposit a copy of the report entitled Report on the Budget 2017 Consultations with the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly; and further, that upon resumption of the sittings of the House, or at the next following session, the Chair shall present the Report to the Legislative Assembly at the earliest available opportunity. (Carole James, MLA)

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON
FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES


CONTENTS
Page
Office of the Conflict of Interest Commissioner	2835
P. Fraser
Office of the Representative for Children and Youth	2838
D. Thomas-Wightman
B. Naughton
A. Markwart
Office of the Merit Commissioner	2845
F. Spencer
Committee Report to the House	2849

S. Hamilton (Chair): Good morning, everyone. I’ll call the committee to order, the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services, for the annual review of statutory officers, their three-year rolling service plans, annual reports and budgetary estimates for fiscal 2017-2018.

Welcome, Office of the Conflict of Interest Commissioner. Mr. Fraser, welcome. Good morning.

S. Hamilton (Chair): As you know, we’ve got about an hour. The floor is yours. We’ll go to questions when you’re all done, after maybe 20 minutes or so.

P. Fraser: Thank you. With me, Mr. Chair, is Linda Pink, who is our executive coordinator. Linda is here to help me with the hard parts, something she’s been doing around these buildings for some years, despite her youthful appearance.

Welcome, all of you, back to Victoria. I suppose, given you’re the only committee that travels and talks to people in every part of the province, the thing you’re most grateful for is the fact that we’re in one time zone.

I hope you have received a copy of the budget proposal which we have sent in advance of our time here today. Of course the great oracle, in terms of things like this, is, as always, Yogi Berra, who said: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” Of course, your committee has to make predictions about the future, and, to the extent that we can in our office, we’re hoping to help you with that today.

The material that you have received in advance contains the usual description of our office. I won’t bother taking your time to read through that. I do, however, want to make a couple of broad comments about the office and its operation which are in addition to what you have already received.

In a working and vibrant democracy such as ours, wherever there is perceived to be a right or a wrong, there’s usually an expectation that there will also be a remedy, either by statute or in some other legal form. That’s relevant in terms of the work that our office does, because we tend to be a kind of default position for people around the province who are looking to be assisted in some way or other.

Our name is somewhat confusing. We have, on a daily basis, a number of people who call — desperate, actually — for information and a place to go. We recognize, in those calls, that the last thing those people really need to hear is that we have no jurisdiction and have no suggestions to make. So part of the work that we do — which is, if you like, off the side of the desk — is to help, where we can, direct those inquiries without venturing ourselves into a form of mission creep.

I mention all of that only because there’s confusion, and we recognize it. It’s legitimate confusion, among members of the public, at least, about: what is a conflict of interest, what is the difference between that and an ethical situation, and how can a citizen and citizens in our province have access to our act and its operations? How can a citizen engage us in a way that will be helpful and satisfying?

We try very hard to keep a list of not the names so much as the numbers of calls like that that we receive. It’s reminiscent, really, of what Leonard Cohen was quoted as saying: “The emergency never ends. Everybody’s heart gets broken.” And he said “everybody gets creamed” from time to time.

We are, in the work that we do — just as, heaven knows, you are in the work that you do — in a position on a daily basis to hear from the public. To answer that need, we have a very small staff of two full-time people, and the rest are part-time or contract. This isn’t a complaint; it’s simply a reality in terms of how we operate.

We have had over the years — not as a matter of vanity but as a matter of some pride in the office — the objective of operating in a frugal and helpful way when it comes to financial matters, so the expenses that we put in for every year are carefully considered. That isn’t something that I say to be congratulated, because that’s what you have every right to expect. But in our case, given that we are very close to where our sausages actually come out, we can tell very quickly what will be the swings and the roundabouts in the course of an operating year.

This is the first thing that anybody in a committee such as you sit on, I think, needs you know: we don’t have a slush fund in the budget. There is no contingency fund that we can draw quietly upon if we have to. We do, however, have a situation where we’re effectively subject to some uncertainties because of the fact that our process is completely complaint-driven.

We don’t know day to day what complaints we’ll receive, and we have no way of being able to reasonably forecast that. That said, there are a couple of categories within our minutiae in the budget which are particularly affected by that.

For example, if we are taken to court, as we have been quite recently, then the STOB which deals with professional services is a STOB that contains the amount designated for what we have to pay in order to be properly represented. For the most part, we have been fortunate, and our appearances in the Supreme Court of British
[ Page 2836 ]
Columbia and other courts have been very few over the years. But when that happens, we obviously deal with it as best we can.

In the current fiscal year, we have now been petitioned into the Supreme Court of British Columbia on an application for judicial review. This is an important application simply because if in fact the court has the jurisdiction to judicially review our decision, then, in my view, that impacts on each and every one of the decisions that are made by all of the officers of the Legislature in British Columbia and, I’m bound to say, all of the equivalent officers around the country. So it’s a matter of considerable interest and will cause us to have to donate some of our resources to dealing with it.

The other variable, I suppose, is that as you will have seen, without talking in too personal a way, my time over the years has increased from originally 75 percent to now 100 percent. That has brought with it increases, as you’ve seen in the numbers over the years. Those increases are significant, but for the most part, what we’ve been able to do is to handle the so-called legal work in-house without having to engage professional services. So to that extent, what we’ve lost in the swings, we make up on the roundabouts in terms of our economies, going forward.

I value the questions that members of this committee have, so I’m hopeful that we can spend most of our time in a Q and A. The other things that I want to mention are that we’ve had a couple of events occur in this current fiscal year that were unexpected, and they’re mentioned in the text.

One was a decision that was made by LAMC, after consideration, to provide me with a payment in lieu of a pension benefit in respect of my employment. That benefit has been paid in this current fiscal year and will be paid in the next fiscal year and is reflected in the numbers that are reproduced in the material that you have seen.

All of that has to do with the fact that there were promises made and promises that couldn’t, for a variety of reasons that were no one’s fault, be kept when I was appointed. The fact was that in order to get certain benefits that are available to officers of the Legislative Assembly, you can’t be aged out. As useful as I am, it turned out that I was aged out on some of them, and none of us had any warning that that was going to happen. I’m very glad that it did, as you can imagine. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be here to talk about it. But it happened.

That’s one of the things that has occurred and has been reflected in the numbers that you’ve seen. The others are scattered. One of them is the complete uncertainty that exists with respect to the entitlements, going forward, of the Provincial Court judges in this province. That’s only relevant because my salary, like the salary of virtually all of the other officers, is tied to the salary of the chief Provincial Court judge.

As I think we all know, the uncertainty in respect of all of that has been compounded recently. We now have, I think, at least two commissions’ reports that are still under consideration. We don’t know where all of that is going to come out. What we do know is that it has to be…. Well, we have to take it into consideration in some way in terms of an understanding of what kind of an impact that’s going to have on our budget.

Essentially, what we have done in numerical terms, monetizing everything I’ve just said, is…. We’ve said: “Okay. The difference between what the budget anticipated and what the budget is being charged for in terms of my salary happens to be X because of the decision that was made in LAMC.” That’s the bad news, if you like.

The good news is that we have also discovered, in this current fiscal year, that the Ministry of Finance, on instructions from PSA, has, for some time, been charging as a benefit against our budget certain things to which I’m certainly not entitled — like CPP payments, like pension payments. I’d love to be contributing to a pension, but I can’t.

All of those things together wound up, believe it or not, amounting to 15 percent of the benefit package. So we’ve credited that number against the other number, and the net of that is what we have added to our bottom line as being the budget request for this year. The addition of that number reflects the fact that we have a stand-pat budget otherwise.

What we’re attempting to do, as the material indicates, in this current fiscal year, is to make the economies that would be necessary to absorb the net roughly $40,000 increase in expense that we hadn’t anticipated — net of the benefits and of the amount that LAMC has decided should be applied against our budget. And we have added about $10,000, roughly — I think it’s actually about $13,000 — to the budget line with respect to professional services to take into account the fact that we may have that kind of an obligation to pay as a result of the petition that I discussed a moment ago.

So bottom line in terms of all of that is that we’re essentially saying: “It’s business as usual, for about the same price.” But to the extent that the numbers have changed, that is the explanation. It would, I hope, lead you to an understanding of why we think we’re going to be able to come in at the number that we are and ask you for a budget of $743,000.

We’d also ask you to continue the contribution that we have, notionally, for capital expenses. We haven’t spent any of that money, but we have a $25,000 amount which is sitting in that suspense account, or however it works. It’s available if we need it for the kinds of things that we may need from time to time and which have been described, I think, in past meetings with this committee.

Mr. Chair, those are my comments. I’d be very pleased to answer any questions.
[ Page 2837 ]

S. Hamilton (Chair): Thank you, Mr. Fraser. I appreciate that. I will go to the committee and see if we have any questions.

Being one of the smallest statutory offices, you run it quite efficiently. I don’t know if there’s a whole lot to talk about, but nevertheless…. Anything? Any comments?

C. James (Deputy Chair): Thank you for the presentation. Just on the number of requests that come forward. Are you seeing an increase? I’m just curious about the kinds of requests that are coming in, both complaints as well as requests, from members.

P. Fraser: In fact, we have had what we report as an increase of about 48 percent over the last year, year over year. Some of that, I’m bound to say, I think is the fact that we were under-reporting stuff before. Now, we’re putting everything in — members and non-members.

We don’t give you, I don’t think, a breakdown as between the public and members. My sense — and Linda can correct me if she disagrees — is that it would be roughly two-thirds members and one-third members of the public.

What we try to do is turn the requests around within 24 hours. If we’re not able to do it in that time frame it’s, I think, never more than about 48 hours at the most.

Interestingly, for me at least, is that it used to be that many, many of the complaints that we got from members of the public had to do with what was occurring in municipal government. That has decreased. I don’t know why. I don’t know whether UBCM or other organizations have done some supplemental work in that area, but that used to be a really high-volume issue for us.

J. Tegart: Thank you very much for your presentation today. As someone who sits on LAMC, and we’re talking about the building in which your office is, I note that there is no conversation about appropriate office space, etc. I assume it’s working well for you?

P. Fraser: Indeed, it is. The only thing that may not be working is when the big one hits.

P. Fraser: I think the life expectancy of our portion of the building is seven seconds. When I speak to my children, they say: “Is that what they think of you — to put you in that kind of a building?” They may be right.

Anyway, the building itself is very serviceable. I’m very grateful to the Legislative Assembly for a couple of things — having the foresight to acquire that building in, I think, about 2009 or so. I can’t quite remember the year.

P. Fraser: Was it 2011? Yeah. So the province actually owns that building, whereas I think previously, it did not. We’ve been very well treated by our landlord, which is you.

All of the furniture we have — this is the commercial — is all recycled. It comes from the buildings and is, we think, charming and comfortable and completely efficient. So we’re very pleased.

The fact that it’s proximate to the buildings and to the chamber when we’re in session is, I think, convenient to the members and appreciated. So we’re very happy. Thank you very much.

The rent that we’re paying, we consider to be market or fair and, we hope, stable.

S. Gibson: Thank you for your presentation. You made mention, earlier, about the fact that the communication you have is about two-thirds with members and one-third with the public.

My question is: what is it that is organized, that is planned, and what is not planned? In other words, what percentage of your work is scheduled, that you design for yourself — where you decide: “I’m going to do this in my scheduling,” all the interviews you have with us, etc.? And what percentage is simply beyond your control — that your life is controlled by others, in other words?

P. Fraser: Yes. Well, that’s a good question. My guess is that it would be one-third, sort of, mandatory — in terms of doing the 85, soon to be 87, interviews every year — and the other two-thirds would be floating, in terms of what comes on before us.

I’m gratified to say, and I say this to public audiences when I’m asked to speak to them about our work, that the members have been very discriminate in terms of the use of our office. It’s very, very seldom that we receive a request that is, perhaps, too obvious. It’s almost always the case that requests have been received (a) in a timely fashion, in terms of the response that’s being asked for, and (b) in terms of how the request is articulated. The
[ Page 2838 ]
cooperation that we receive from members of the House, on all sides, has been superb.

We don’t have the ability to fine people for not, for example, making filings when they should. It’s more moral persuasion. The last thing that we want to do is to acquire the reputation of being a scold. Quite frankly, for whatever reasons — largely, in my view, because of the cooperation we get with the members — it’s never come at all to a point where we’ve had to press harder than we would otherwise want to in order to be administratively efficient.

That open two-thirds that you mention is sometimes an interesting Christmas cracker. At the moment, for example, I’m doing some work in Alberta because the conflict-of-interest commissioner there had a perceived conflict of interest herself. As some of you may know, I’m involved in now doing a re-investigation of former Premier Redford — some aspect of her departure from the House in Alberta. That’s not likely to happen every year.

We’re not getting any pay for that, incidentally, but there may be a payback time. Who knows? It’s part of what you do.

I only mention that because it’s sort of off the wall, but in many ways, it’s the kind of thing that can crop up.

In the act itself, we have a couple of potentials that could occur but typically have not. The Legislative Assembly could ask our office to provide it with an opinion on something. That has never happened in the life span of the office. Or the cabinet could ask. That has happened only once, in the ’90s. So that’s a potential for time.

We typically have a fairly active involvement with our colleagues across the country who do this kind of work, and we’re actively discussing with them, from time to time — once a year in an organized fashion, otherwise on a casual basis — a number of subjects that are coming up.

Let me mention one that I have mentioned before in your meetings, and that has to do with social media and the extent to which social media impacts on obligations under the act. That may not be immediately apparent, but for example, we have rules — not rules that our office has created or the act has created but rules which you have created for yourselves about constituency offices and what can be done there, what can be produced from them and what could emanate from them in terms of messages and so on.

With social media, the horizon there is virtually unlimited. When you get into the interface of what’s political and what’s non-political and what’s, therefore, appropriate and inappropriate in terms of a constituency office, you can see that there are issues that would easily arise. We’re looking at all of that.

We’re also, I think, assisted — and the public is assisted — by knowing what’s happening across the country. In the recent past in terms of the work we do, it’s been important to understand the differences that exist across the country — for example, in the whole election financing world. Some provinces are dealing with it very differently than others, and understanding that and knowing that is important in terms of having to make decisions that are focused on our province but take into account, to some extent, what other people have decided to do.

Seeing none, Mr. Fraser, thank you very much. Ms. Pink, thank you very much for taking the time. Very much appreciated. Continue the great work.

P. Fraser: Thank you all very much. It’s awfully nice, I’m sure, to be closer to the end rather than just further from the beginning of the work that you are doing this year.

Can I, Mr. Chair, beg your indulgence to say that everything that all of us are doing in our respective offices, I think, can benefit from what Leonard Cohen said in “Anthem”: “Ring the bells that still can ring. Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.”

S. Hamilton (Chair): I welcome the Office of the Representative for Children and Youth — Dawn Thomas-Wightman, our deputy representative.

S. Hamilton (Chair): You probably are aware of the routine. We can go on the presentation 20 minutes or so, and then we can go to the committee for any questions they might have after that. We might have one brief interruption when we get a call in from Jennifer Rice, who will be, hopefully, calling in shortly. So if you’re ready, the floor is yours.

D. Thomas-Wightman: We’re pleased to be here today to address the committee. I’d like to start by introducing the senior staff members here accompanying me. On my left, Alan Markwart. I believe his new title is chief executive operating officer — maybe. We change it frequently. I’m happy to have, to his left, Dianne Buljat, CFO — chief
[ Page 2839 ]
financial officer. On my right is Bill Naughton, associate deputy representative and chief investigator, and Blair Mitchell, executive director for advocacy. They’re here to assist with any questions that may come up following the presentation.

As you know, I’m here today in my role as Deputy Representative for Children and Youth to provide an overview of the budget requests for 2017-2018 and the proposed rolling budget for 2019-2020 for the Office of the RCY. Our office budget for the current fiscal year consists of $8.83 million and $50,000 capital. The RCY currently includes 61 FTEs in three different offices: Victoria, Burnaby and Prince George.

As this committee is no doubt aware, Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond’s second and final term as representative officially ends this month, and we expect an interim representative to be named shortly, followed by the selection of a permanent representative. In light of this transition phase our office is now in, near the end of one representative’s tenure and awaiting the beginning of a new representative’s term, I come here today to request what is close to a stand-pat budget for 2017-2018.

This budget proposal does include a request for a small lift amounting to 1.59 percent of our total annual budget to cover expenses that will increase incrementally in the areas of salary and benefits, information technology and operation and maintenance of vehicles.

S. Hamilton (Chair): Jennifer, we’ve just started the meeting. You haven’t missed too much.

J. Rice: Great. I know it’s hard when people aren’t there in person, but I couldn’t get there. There were no flights.

D. Thomas-Wightman: No worries. So we’re requesting a total budget increase of $140,000, which would bring our annual budget for the RCY to a total of $8.97 million.

Before I get too far into the details of our budget request, I’d like to begin with a brief overview of our office. The establishment of the office was a recommendation of the 2006 Hughes review into the province’s child-serving system. In that report, the hon. Ted Hughes recommended that government establish an independent body to advocate for children and youth, review and investigate critical injuries and deaths, and monitor and report on systemic issues across the child-serving system to better improve the effectiveness and responses of MCFD services.

Independence, public accountability and transparency are central to the representative’s role as seen by Mr. Hughes.

In our review of critical injuries and deaths, we must consider a broad range of events, from broken bones on a playground to motor vehicle accidents to acts of violence and even murder. Therefore, we require an investigative team that is skilled, that can exercise powers akin to a public inquiry and that can support clear public reporting as necessary around incidents. This is essential if lessons are to be learned and the system to be improved for children and families.

Our critical injury and death review investigation team — or CID, as we call it — has seen its workload increase tremendously over recent years. In 2015-2016, RCY received reports of 138 deaths and 665 critical injuries to children and youth in care or receiving reviewable services, marking a 53 percent increase in the total number of reports received compared to the previous year.

This fiscal we’ve received 453 such reports to date — 45 more than during the same period the previous year. So the trend continues upward. This results in more files requiring review and, ultimately, more files requiring either individual or aggregate investigations and reports.

We were extremely grateful when we were granted an additional $656,000 for the current fiscal’s budget to help handle this increased workload. Those funds have enabled us to conduct a number of investigations, including the most recent investigation into the death of Nick, a Métis youth from the Fraser Valley, whose substance use issues prompted his desperate parents to use the youth justice system as a means for seeking help. The report from that investigation, Last Resort, was released by our office last month.

Among the other CID reports released by our office during this calendar year was A Tragedy in Waiting, the story of an indigenous youth with serious mental health issues who committed suicide after not receiving the supports and services he needed when he needed them.

Other major investigations by our office that are currently in progress include a review of a high-profile suicide of a youth who had been in care and spent a lengthy amount of time in a hotel placement and another of a youth who committed suicide while receiving treatment at B.C. Children’s. Those two reviews are currently underway. We expect them to be completed in the next two months, with release dates in 2017.

Next, our research and monitoring team, meanwhile, tackles a wide range of systemic issues, from front-line social work staffing, educational and health results for children and youth in the care of government and planning for permanency for those in care.

Among the most recent projects completed by this team was a review of youth substance use services in B.C., which was released in May, and Too Many Victims, an aggregate review of sexualized violence experienced by children and youth in the care of government between 2011 and 2014. The report from that investigation was released last month.
[ Page 2840 ]

Other major reviews by this team that are underway and expected to be released in the next few months include a review of the delegated aboriginal agencies and a review of educational outcomes for children in care and also an update on the ministry progress on adoptions.

Our third and major area of work at RCY is advocacy. As you know, it’s a service through which we directly help children, youth, young adults and their families navigate the system of services and care in this province. Our advocates field an extremely broad range of concerns and requests for assistance from youth in care, those receiving services and young adults between 19 and 24 who are eligible to receive services from CLBC.

This is a much-needed service and is reflected in our stats. Since 2007, we’ve received 17,000 open advocacy calls. The advocacy responsibilities are particularly important as many children, youth and their families find dealing with a large government bureaucracy extremely difficult and, sometimes, intimidating — especially for children and youth whose families are particularly vulnerable.

In addition to those three main areas of work — CID, monitoring and advocacy — I would like to point out the continued development of our indigenous strategies and partnership team at RCY. As you know, indigenous children, youth and families have been a long major focus for our office. There continues to be a vast overrepresentation of aboriginal children in care who make up 9 percent of the total population yet are 61 percent of the total number of kids in care.

To give the committee an idea of current numbers, of the 7,142 children in care in B.C. as of October, 4,373 were aboriginal. So the need has continued. I can’t tell you how much work we do on the aboriginal front, and it was too much to manage without a specific team that could address some of the issues around indigenous child welfare.

Over the past two years, we formalized the indigenous lens by developing our indigenous strategies and partnerships team, which works to ensure that an indigenous perspective is a significant part of our work every day at the RCY.

I’m very proud to talk about some work the team did last month. This team, along with staff members at RCY, in partnership with staff at MCFD and delegated aboriginal agencies and other youth and family–serving organizations, held a forum for 27 indigenous children and youth in care, in which we heard directly from those kids many suggestions about their care and how their lives could be improved.

Every one that walked away from that forum was moved by the willingness of the youth to engage and really talk about concrete ways to improve the system. We do plan to host a few more of those across the province and then release a report and ensure that their voice is shared and heard.

The central theme of our work at RCY has always been a need for stability and accountability in the child-serving system and a need to assist citizens, particularly children and youth, with navigating the complexities of the system. Our independence is critical, as it reassures the public that there is a body providing oversight and, when necessary, acting as a liaison between government and those being served.

The Hughes review said this office should be established to “assist, encourage and sometimes prod the government to be more aware and responsive to the individual concerns of children, youth and families and to recommend changes that will address broader problems in the child welfare system.” This remains an accurate description of our mission.

As I previously mentioned, we are requesting a 1.59 percent increase, which would bring our total annual budget at RCY in 2017-18 to $8.97 million. It represents a lift of $140,000 and would cover the following: increases to salaries and benefits for our schedule A employees, in keeping with the BCGEU master agreement; funding for a small number of staff reclassifications to deal with employee retention; the reallocation of existing resources to develop our indigenous strategies team; increased annual network and data storage costs for Shared Services B.C.; increased software maintenance for CITAR, which is our database system at the RCY office; and finally, increased maintenance costs related to the age and condition of our two 2008 Ford Escape Hybrids.

I just want to take a second to highlight a couple of areas that are not covered by this request but that we should note.

There’s a potential pension remuneration issue that was identified with the outgoing representative. The issue stems from the recommendation made by the Clerk in 2006 regarding the formula that would be applied to calculate pensionable service so that it would be consistent with other offices. The recommendation was not actioned.

There is some uncertainty about the potential liability at this time. If, however, it proves to be a true liability, it may impact our office’s finances. At present, we do not have a valuation of this liability, so we are unable to fully inform the committee. If this does become a liability for the office, an update will be provided as available.

This budget request does not include a potential salary and benefits increase for RCY’s management employees. This group is subject to the management classification and compensation framework. Changes to this framework are currently being rolled out throughout various government offices. We expect additional information in the new year. Any changes may result in increased salary and benefit costs for this group. As such, we may need to return to this committee to address those.
[ Page 2841 ]

I will leave it at that. Along with senior staff that have accompanied me, I will be happy to answer any questions the committee may have.

E. Foster: I have a sort of preface before I ask the question. This is not intended to minimize any of the tragedies that have happened, at all. But has anybody ever made a comparison between children in care and children not in care as far as deaths and injuries go, as a percentage of the population?

D. Thomas-Wightman: I believe that information is there. I don’t know if we have it handy.

B. Naughton: We do know that the rates of injury in the child-in-care population generally trend higher. That trend exists, really, across almost every jurisdiction, internationally as well. The exact numbers I’d have to come back to you on. I don’t have those figures in front of me right now.

There are characteristics of the child-in-care population that do predispose them to vulnerabilities. For example, it may be medical fragility which is a factor for some children. There may also be pre-existing risk factors that place them at increased risk. I think you see that very clearly, for example, in our report on sexualized violence. A lot of the risk factors that actually result in children being brought into care — without good strategies to mitigate those risks, that risk continues on for those children.

The general answer would be that that population remains more at risk than the average, particularly for the kinds of traumatic violence, including sexualized violence, that we’ve reported on in the past.

J. Tegart: Dawn, you mentioned that staff will be reclassified. How many staff, and what will that mean to your budget?

D. Thomas-Wightman: I believe it was about three staff. But Alan is able to answer that question.

A. Markwart: It’s actually a few more than three. The total amount is actually estimated at about $150,000 for reclassifications. We’re only asking for $100,000 of that. We think that we can manage the remaining $50,000 just as a result of other savings and internal reallocations.

The issue that we’ve been trying to address is recruitment and retention. I can give you a few examples of that. For example, in the monitoring section we have three PhDs who are research officers. Some have longer experience than others. If we continued to not recognize their skills and experience, they, understandably, would go off elsewhere. So we created a senior research officer position, which obviously costs more in terms of salary and benefits.

We had the indigenous strategies group that Dawn referenced. There were two aboriginal employees associated with that who were at a very low rate of pay who needed to be reclassified as well. There were reclassifications of two executive director positions. One was the executive director of advocacy, and the other was the deputy chief investigator.

A. Markwart: Plus benefits, yes, because you have to add in about 25 percent for benefits.

S. Gibson: A few questions. The first actually relates to that one. Regarding retention, knowing a little bit, as I do, about HR, often people’s unhappiness is not necessarily related to their compensation. So I’m presuming you do exit interviews with people when they leave.

I’m wondering, related to my colleague’s question a moment ago…. Just because somebody gets paid more, it doesn’t necessarily increase their satisfaction. Sometimes they’re just a better-paid dissatisfied person. I’m wondering if you could just speak to that a little bit.

We do, do exit interviews of all of our staff. These staff that Alan referred to were paid, I would say, significantly lower than other staff, so there were some issues around equity amongst the different teams.

I guess most important, on the monitoring team, is those PhD staff who could really go many other places. We rely on them for specific information regarding monitoring and research. So we feel that with that increase in salary, we’ll be able to retain that staff and at that level.

We have a significantly high number of graduate degree staff at the RCY, and we want to definitely retain them. The pay was significantly lower and was why we wanted to make those changes, including on the indigenous strategies team. Those staff were brought in almost at administrative rates. With the work they do and with the political nature of the indigenous strategies team, we needed to compensate them more equitably.

S. Gibson: The second question, which I guess, I will admit, is a bit controversial in one way. You outlined very
[ Page 2842 ]
clearly the tragedy that’s experienced by the aboriginal folks — 9 percent of the population and 61 percent in care. This is my query to you, so I don’t have an assumption here. I’m just presenting it.

Is this partly aggravated by the fact that, according to my recollection of last year’s presentation, you’re trying to keep those folks in the aboriginal community, whereas in some instances — I’m not saying all; don’t hear that — it may be better to get them, at least temporarily, out of that community and the milieu of problems? They may do better, in some cases, outside their own community because of some systemic problems.

I know it’s a controversial question, but it seems like it’s going up, instead of down. Your records show, I think, that last year it was 45 percent or whatever. Now it’s 61. Are there other solutions that may involve a non-aboriginal community, even though you’re trying to keep those folks in their own community? You know what I mean?

D. Thomas-Wightman: Yup, I know what you mean. I think it’s a fair question, for sure, to ask.

The number of aboriginal children in care continues to rise, despite the efforts of the ministry to lower those numbers. So right — 61. Last year, I think it was about 50-something. So it continues to increase. Most of those kids are not in their community. Most of the aboriginal kids in care are with non-aboriginal caregivers.

The research is really clear to show that culture is a protective factor. If we can connect those kids to their community and culture — to healthy community and healthy culture, I think, is the piece that I want to really stress — that culture is a protective factor and can protect them.

I know government — Minister Cadieux and other ministers — is looking at governance as an issue, as a response to aboriginal child welfare and jurisdiction. Something has got to change, because it keeps increasing, despite money, despite people coming together and trying to make a difference. But it just rises. We don’t want to be, in ten years, where it’s 80 or 90 percent, like some other provinces. I think the jurisdiction question is a good one to bring back on the table and have that further discussion, build on what’s already been done.

I would say that that’s not the case. Most of the aboriginal kids in care are, in fact, in non-aboriginal placements outside their community.

S. Gibson: A closing supplementary, if I may. What about adoptions? Maybe you could speak to that a little bit, too. As long as they’re feeling untethered, if you will, they won’t have that sense of belonging or permanence.

D. Thomas-Wightman: Exactly. That’s been a significant push for our office, so thank you for raising that.

Although the ministry had a ten-year high in adoptions the previous year, what we’ve noticed this year is it’s been significantly lowered again. There was a significant push to meet their own numbers, goals that they had set for themselves. Since then, the numbers have been reduced to about 15 a month of adoptions, where it was about 30 a month when they were meeting their goals. The number of aboriginal adoptions is even smaller.

Those numbers are continuing to be a concern for our office and something that we push. But you’re exactly right. If there’s permanence, that permanency is also a protective factor. We know that for children who age out of care, the risk increases for any critical injury, for death. I mean, sometimes they age onto the street. You know the stats. So permanency is a big push and some of the work that our indigenous strategies team participates in.

We can’t keep up with the work. There are so many…. I mean, 60 percent of the kids in care are aboriginal. We’re a long way from resolving it.

C. James (Deputy Chair): More a statement than a question. I just think it’s important to emphasize, as you reported on for the committee, the fact that the workload doesn’t decrease. It increases. Whether you’re talking about critical incidents and death, whether you’re talking about advocacy, the numbers continue to rise. I think it’s just important for us…. When we take a look at budget requests, it’s very rare, over the last number of years that I’ve certainly been on the committee, that we’ve seen increases come forward that are related to the workload.

You’ve managed the workload at the office, the staff have managed it, and I think that speaks to the incredible staff that you have, who’ve been able to manage that — including the indigenous team that’s been put together, including other projects, including the additional change in age category that occurred as well. I think all those are extra pieces that have been picked up by the office.

I just want to express my appreciation to you and your staff for the work that you do. I think it’s important to put it in context, when we’re taking a look at budget requests — the extraordinary workload.

As you do your job in the office, the workload increases, not decreases, which is different than many offices and many ministries. When the work improves, the workload usually decreases. In your office, it increases, as you see the ability to come forward, and that’s what we want. So thank you for the work.

D. Thomas-Wightman: Thank you very much for that. I do want to echo your comments around the staff. They’ve worked so hard these past few years, and their workload continues to increase. Of all the places I’ve worked, I’m so impressed with this staff and a team that just manage it and are committed to the work. So thank you. I appreciate that.

G. Heyman: Thank you, Dawn, for the presentation — and your colleagues. I think most British Columbians
[ Page 2843 ]
would agree that there is little that government does in the social realm that’s more important, or as important even, than providing services to children, both protecting vulnerable children and educating them for the future.

I think the reaction of the public and commentators at the end of the term of Mary Ellen Turpel-Lafond reflected that, in terms of people’s appreciation of the goals that have been met and the issues that have been identified by her. So I just want to acknowledge that on the record. I certainly share that view, as I’m sure you and all your staff do.

There’s a great interest publicly in seeing that work continue, so I echo Carole’s reference to your claim that the workload actually increases. It increases. We wish it didn’t, but it’s important work.

Also, we’ve had a lot of discussion at this committee about the advocacy permanency project. In the end, after a couple of presentations from the representative’s office, there was no additional funding provided to the representative’s office to pursue this. I don’t think it’s because of a lack of recognition of the importance of the issue by members of the committee, but there was diversity of opinion about what the best way to meet that need was — whether it was internal to the ministry or with additional assistance and advocacy from the representative’s office.

I note your reference that the office is not repeating its request for additional resources at this time, while waiting for a new representative as well as the report from Grand Chief Ed John. But when I add to that your comment that permanent placements are down, not up — in fact, they’re down by 50 percent or more, depending on the community, non-aboriginal or aboriginal — I don’t think, in anybody’s mind, that this is an issue that should continue unaddressed.

Should I assume that when you say that you’re putting the request on hold, it’s not for an entire fiscal year; it’s until there is a review to determine if other measures are going to meet this need? If not, should I assume that the representative’s office would, potentially, bring forward an additional request in the middle of the fiscal year?

D. Thomas-Wightman: You’re right. The number of adoptions and permanency issues remain high, specifically around the aboriginal community. It was one of the reasons we brought that initial request forward. It’s because of our established relationships with the aboriginal community. So while we await Grand Chief Ed John’s report, and when a new representative comes, we want to revisit the permanency project and then could come before the committee at that time.

We’re not waiting for any further evaluation per se. We see that the numbers have been reduced significantly, despite the injection of $2 million to $3 million into the ministry budget. What will happen at the end of the year, I can’t say — where they’ll end up at, their numbers — but right now, they’re running short, and the need for permanency remains high.

It was good that we had some attention on it for a couple of years, and it was great to see high numbers for the first time in ten years, but the drastic drop in numbers is a significant concern.

This issue is so…. I don’t know if the word is “complex,” but the relationship between aboriginal communities and the ministry is so strained and continues to be strained. It’s not just two years of work; it’s significant years that it’s going to take to get us back on track with this. So we definitely see the need for that project to go forward but want to wait for the new representative, and we’re interested to see what the Grand Chief has to say in his report around permanency.

G. Heyman: Could you refresh my memory as to when you think Grand Chief Ed John’s report will be released?

D. Thomas-Wightman: Any day is, I guess, the best estimate. We’ve heard different timelines, and we understand it could be this week. We’re hopeful that it’s sooner rather than later. We haven’t seen a draft yet. We’ve asked to see a draft. I understand the ministry does have a draft.

G. Heyman: I’d just close by saying that it is a concern, and I’m sure it’s a concern for every member of the committee. I don’t think it’s simply a…. It is a critical issue that permanent placements are significantly reduced. But underlying that, I think, it’s also a concern that the beginnings of foundations that were laid for better relations and better outcomes can be eroded and would have to be rebuilt, That’s in nobody’s interest.

J. Tegart: Dawn, the discussion around First Nations and the percentage of clientele that are First Nations within the ministry. How many staff…? What’s your percentage of representation within your staff? Certainly in my area, I represent 10 percent of the First Nations bands and have many, many conversations on what we should be looking at in regards to protection of children and where we have gaps and where we don’t. But for so many years, I’ve heard: “We’re tired of someone coming in from the outside and telling us.”

When we look at what percentage of the people that we’re serving, are we representative in our staff? I would ask the same question of us, and I’m sure you talk about it.

D. Thomas-Wightman: Definitely. That’s part of our indigenous strategies plan. We have a plan to address staff representation and retention and recruitment of First Nations or indigenous staff.
[ Page 2844 ]

Our executive, before Mary Ellen leaves, is 50 percent indigenous, and I believe we sit at between 5 and 10 percent of our staff that are indigenous, which is reflective of 9 percent of the population. We have a goal that we’ve set for ourselves, and we asked the ministry to set the same goal. We asked the ministry to look at 30 percent as a starting point. As of right now, all of our hirings have an aboriginal preference. Anybody who applies that is aboriginal will get that preference on the hiring.

We’re also looking at working with the human rights agency around making some aboriginal musts so that certain positions must be aboriginal. We have to go through a process for that, and we’re engaged in that at this point. The executive staff can tell you that it’s a conversation I bring up almost every week, and it’s very important to me that we have indigenous representation. It’s one of the reasons I’m so proud of our team that we have: the indigenous strategies team, which is 100 percent indigenous. It’s important for that.

Hughes talks about hiring indigenous staff, as well, as being important to this work for exactly the reasons that you said. So we continue to work towards hiring more indigenous staff and then retaining them once they’re here. At the ministry, there’s a problem with retention, and we don’t want to mirror that problem.

R. Austin: Thanks, Dawn, for your report. I’m new to this committee, so forgive me if my questions are something that has been brought up last year or in previous years.

You talked about setting up a panel where you invited kids in care to come and discuss openly things that might be done to improve the system. I’m wondering whether your mandate allows you also to have a similar kind of discussion with social workers at the front-line level in a setting that would enable them to speak truth to power.

I have a lot of connections. I went and did a bachelor of social work, and I’d say that two-thirds of my cohort went into child welfare. So I’m connected to a lot of people who work in the north as social workers on the front line. I don’t want to repeat the things I’ve heard here, because I don’t think it’s representative of what might be happening around the province and it would just be anecdotal. But I’m wondering whether your legal mandate allows you to actually go and do something like that.

I think everybody around this committee, and everyone who reads all of these reports, knows that it’s a system, unfortunately, that’s very much crisis-driven. Any organization that’s crisis-driven doesn’t enable the staff to even catch their breath to do the kind of good long-term work necessary to bring some of these stats down.

I’m just wondering whether you’re able to do that or whether that’s something that you’re not really permitted to go and do.

D. Thomas-Wightman: No, we’re able to do that, and we do that. There are a number of ways we do that. First, about 50 percent of our advocacy calls are staff themselves, from MCFD and delegated agencies which call in asking for help managing the system. Or they give us recommendations or update us on what’s happening so that we get a front-line view of what’s happening on the front lines. Our monitoring staff receive some of those, but our advocacy staff also, on specific cases. They will call in for systemic issues and for specific cases.

The other thing that we do, and all the teams participate in this, is some outreach with staff. Often our staff will go to a ministry office and meet with the social workers just to discuss. Perhaps it’s in response to a specific report or just to touch base and see how things are going. That happens all year long.

The other thing that’s happened in the past is that we have gone out and met with BCGEU staff to talk about the issues from their perspective as well. Mary Ellen and myself have done a number of those trips — probably due back in the north to do that.

So yeah, we continue an outreach. We haven’t pulled together staff in one large meeting or conference to get that, but it’s something we could look at. I do feel we capture that front-line voice through the various programs, and we have really strong working relationships with the front-line staff. They feel supported by us, and I feel like they’re pretty honest about what’s happening on the front line. They’re committed to their families and children they work with, and they want to see change as well.

J. Rice: I think most of my questions have been asked. I was very curious around the permanency project or the advocacy for permanency. I think I’ll just wait till Ed John’s report comes out. I guess my questions are around why the numbers are still decreasing, despite the influx of financial support. I don’t know if that can be answered today.

Mine — I’d like track back to the whole issue of staff reclassification. It’s sort of on the theme where Simon was going. I’m a little perplexed as to why we would reclassify someone unless there’s been a demonstrable change to the person’s job. You don’t usually classify someone just to keep them in the job unless the job has changed itself — again, quite demonstrably — and there’s a process, I believe, in government for assessing that.

To me, it’s the cart before the horse, if you will. Usually people will chase the pay grade. The pay grade doesn’t chase the people just to keep them there. Maybe you’d like to comment on that.
[ Page 2845 ]

D. Thomas-Wightman: I can speak to that. In the development of the indigenous strategies team, we took some staff from the advocacy team. When they were recruited for those positions, they were quite different than what we expected from them on the indigenous strategies team. So we asked them to move, and they moved at their same salary grid. As the year unfolded, we had more demand on those staff and a higher increase of accountability — specifically, with the political nature. Those staff have to meet with UBCIC and AFN, and we expect them to be able to do that on their own.

The job did change drastically, and the amount of work changed it drastically too. Coming from an advocacy team, where they were youth-focused, to having responsibilities under this indigenous strategies team was really a significant jump. In fact, we probably still aren’t paying them what they need to be paid, reflected in the duties that they have.

In addition to that, on the monitoring team, the positions that we’ve removed to senior analysts…. There’s a higher expectation for those staff as well. They’ll be required to do some supervision of staff. They’ll be required to lead some projects. For all the positions that we’ve reclassified, there’s an expectation that it’ll be different and more responsibility with those positions.

S. Hamilton (Chair): I wasn’t sure if I’d missed it, but that wasn’t necessarily pointed out in your presentation. That’s what’s important to me — that the actual job has changed, not necessarily the people. Okay. Thank you.

A. Markwart: Well, I’d add that in several cases, the positions were reclassified and then posted. So there was a competition. It wasn’t simply gifted to the employees.

S. Hamilton (Chair): Thank you very much. I appreciate you taking the time. Enjoy the rest of what appears to be a beautiful day. Take care.

S. Hamilton (Chair): We’re welcoming the Office of the Merit Commissioner — Fiona Spencer.

As much time as you need for your presentation, up to about 20 minutes. Then we can go to the committee for questions after that. The floor is yours.

F. Spencer: Thank you, Mr. Chair and Members. I was going to say I’m accompanied today by Dave Van Swieten. Obviously, you know who he is — our executive director of shared services. I’m pleased to appear before you today to discuss the work of the Office of the Merit Commissioner.

As you know, in the spring, the committee accepted a written submission from me in lieu of a personal appearance, but I did wish to express my appreciation for having been given the opportunity to meet with you at that time.

Before I start my remarks, I would like to mention that this past April I was privileged to be reappointed for a new term as B.C.’s Merit Commissioner. I look forward to continuing to serve in this important role.

This morning I’ll make my remarks brief, giving you a status report on the work of the office, reviewing last year’s budget expenditures, addressing some minor budget pressures I’m facing in the current year and finishing by presenting my budget request for the coming fiscal years.

The Office of the Merit Commissioner, which supports me as a part-time appointee, consists of five dedicated public servants. We’re currently assisted by four auditors, who work on an as-and-when- required contract basis, and by an external audit advisory committee.

Our annual report was tabled in May, which outlined work completed in the 2015-16 fiscal year. It included summaries of the results of our 2014-15 merit performance audit, which I discussed with you at this time last year, and of the staffing review activity conducted in the 2015-16 fiscal year.

Conducting random audits of appointments to and from within the B.C. public service to monitor the application of the merit principle and conducting reviews of specific appointments at the request of employee applicants are the office’s two main lines of business. If warranted and possible within resourcing levels, we may also conduct special audits or studies of specific appointment types or elements of the staffing process which have an impact on merit-based hiring.

In July 2016, we also published a report on the staffing reviews received during the 2015-16 fiscal year. This report indicated that eight requests for review by the Merit Commissioner were received, seven of which were eligible for consideration. In all cases, based on the grounds
[ Page 2846 ]
put forward by the requesters, hiring decisions were upheld and the reviews were dismissed.

While the number of reviews conducted was significantly fewer than the 19 undertaken the previous year, no conclusions can be drawn with respect to the reasons for this decline, as time has shown that demand can fluctuate from year to year with no relationship to the overall appointment activity in the public service.

When a review request is received, we give priority to the investigation and analysis of the complaint, targeting to provide a report in response to the requester and the organization head within 30 days of receipt. At this point in the current fiscal year, we’ve already received seven requests for review.

We’ve just finalized our report on the merit performance audit for the 2015-16 fiscal year, in which we examine 321 appointments across all organizations. For the first time, our audits found that appointments with issues and flaws exceeded the number of appointments that were free of such weaknesses. These issues range from those which could be considered somewhat administrative, such as missing documentation, to those that are more serious, such as applicants being incorrectly eliminated at the shortlisting stage or being incorrectly ranked at the conclusion of a selection process.

In all cases, however, it could not be determined that the issues identified had a negative impact on the outcome of the competitive process. Otherwise, a finding of “merit not applied” would have occurred. I’m pleased that the percentage of appointments where there was a finding of “merit not applied” has decreased.

These results were provided to the B.C. Public Service Agency. They responded with a commitment to address concerns raised and acknowledged that the feedback that we provide assists them with continuous improvement of hiring in the public service. I believe that this acknowledgement by the agency underlines the value-added of an independent perspective on new hiring methods being introduced, which are intended to address changing or evolving demands in the public service.

I’d like to acknowledge and commend the positive and professional manner in which the agency and organization heads receive and respond to our audit reports and take steps to implement change and improve practice.

The audit of appointments in the 2016-17 fiscal year has commenced, and 134 appointments from the first half of the fiscal year have been selected for audit.

You’ll see from the submitted three-year service plan that in addition to ensuring we fulfil our obligations with respect to our core lines of business — audits and reviews — we’d like to conduct two special audits in the coming fiscal years. One relates to the appointment of auxiliaries in the public service and the other, to direct appointments. These appointment types must be merit-based and are, therefore, of interest. Should workload and resources permit, the audit of auxiliary appointments would be conducted next fiscal year and the audit of direct appointments, the following year.

Now turning to my budget submission, you’ll see — on page 3 of my submission and table 2 of the templates that you requested we complete — that the office concluded the last fiscal year with an extremely small amount of unexpended funds: approximately $8,000, or less than 1 percent of the voted appropriation. Higher-than-expected appointment activity, which increased the cost of conducting our merit performance audit, contributed to this budget pressure. To manage to such a tight budget required ongoing monitoring and adjustments to spending.

In the current fiscal year, I am once again expecting to face some financial pressure due to ongoing and unavoidable cost pressures related to mandated increases to salaries and benefits and the costs associated with conducting the annual audit activity. In an effort to manage the merit performance audit activity and the associated costs, and to be less subject to fluctuation in costs due to changes in appointment activity in the public service, we’ve amended our method of establishing a sample size.

Going forward, we’ll be using a fixed number of randomly selected appointments for audits, rather than a percentage of all appointments, as we have used in the past years. This change in approach — recommended by Statistics Canada, which now provides the office with statistical support and advice — protects the validity and generalized ability of results. As well, it enables the office to manage the audit activity and associated costs more efficiently.

Of course, as in the past, we’ll continue to manage our overall budget prudently. However, I’m concerned that, given the limited flexibility in many of the areas of expenditure, we may once again be faced with a budget crunch towards the end of the year.

To avoid a need to delay fulfilling our operational commitments, I request that the committee give consideration to providing the Office of the Merit Commissioner access to $25,000 in additional funding for the current fiscal year, should it prove required.

You’ll see from my budget submission and the office’s three-year budget plan at table 1, that for the coming fiscal year, I am requesting an increase to the base budget for the Office of the Merit Commissioner of $71,000 or approximately 6.5 percent. This request doesn’t assume the committee’s approval of the $25,000 I was just mentioning. If these funds are added to my base budget for this fiscal year, then the requested increase for 2017-18 would, in fact, decrease to about $46,000 or 4.2 percent.

In the past four years, there’s only been one minor increase in funding for the office. We’ve worked hard to manage internally any budgetary impact from inflation
[ Page 2847 ]
and other non-discretionary costs — such as government-mandated increases and adjustments, shared-services and IT costs, and building occupancy — through a reduction to travel, limiting backfilling during extended leave periods, vacation leave usage and reductions in contract spending in areas other than those directly related to the audit activity.

I think we’ve exhausted the flexibility in our budget to continue to absorb these costs, and the budget pressures we are experiencing in the current fiscal year are expected to continue. Therefore, I respectfully request consideration be given to increasing the base operating budget for the Office of the Merit Commissioner by $71,000 in fiscal 2017-18 and by $4,000 in each of the following fiscal years. No additional funds for capital expenditures are requested.

Those are the only remarks I’d make at this time. Thank you. If you have any questions, I’m happy to respond.

S. Gibson: A couple of quick questions. Thank you for your presentation and the details in your report. Very clear.

This is not a criticism. Can you sometimes overlap a little bit with the work of the Auditor General? You’re doing some analyses of some ministries in the way they do some of their hiring. Some of those characteristics sound a little bit like some of the work being done by the Auditor General, where they come in and randomly look at a government department. You’ve got all the departments listed here. That’s very helpful.

I sometimes sense that there’s an overlap, perhaps. I know you wouldn’t agree. What are your comments when I say that there seems to be an overlap, somewhat, with what the Auditor General does?

F. Spencer: As far as I’m aware, there’s no overlap whatsoever. The audit of appointments to and within the public service is within my mandate. I don’t believe the Auditor General would step into that area.

S. Gibson: That’s true. They don’t do that specifically. Since I’ve come on this committee, the Auditor General will sometimes randomly examine the operation of a particular department or sub-department of a ministry, a school board — that kind of thing. They’ll do it in such a way to examine, on the HR level: how is the hiring is going? How are the efficiencies? If there’s not a clear overlap, I sometimes sense that there could be, possibly. Anyway, that’s just a….

F. Spencer: I’m sorry. I’d have to agree. I don’t see that overlap or potential there.

S. Gibson: Another question that I have is: what about if there’s a systemic problem with a certain department? You do a very good job of scrutinizing. You’ve got your staff. If you find that there’s a chronic problem with a certain department whereas maybe a supervisor or some morale issue that’s affecting…. So people are coming to you and requesting you look at it. How do you track those to the benefit of government?

F. Spencer: There are two aspects to what you’re talking about. One is the random audit of appointments, which, of course, we do across the public service. It’s not by ministry that we look at these appointments. But you’re quite right. Especially in some of the larger organizations where there’s a lot of appointment activity, we may get quite a number of appointments to audit within that organization.

If we see problems that we could identify as being systemic…. First of all, the deputy head is advised of all the audit results. In my letter to the deputy head — or the organization head, I should say…. When I’m reporting the results of our audits, if we’ve seen a systemic issue…. I’d say it’s rare that we could tie it to one individual hiring manager just because of the randomness of the selection, but we might see a practice within an organization that we think is problematic. I would draw that to his or her attention.

We also report all the results to the B.C. Public Service Agency. That’s where we also might see something systemwide, not just within one organization but across the public service, that we think is a problematic practice or policy. Then steps can be taken to address that. If we see something, the following year, when we’re doing audits, we would audit for that practice to see if improvements had been made.

S. Gibson: As a closing supplementary, does your communication also involve the dissatisfied employee? The employee will engage you. You scrutinize the process. You determine that the employee, in fact, was well treated by the department, and you dismiss their claim.

But that’s not the end of it, is it? That employee may still experience some angst, and you don’t know. Once you’ve decided, you move on. You don’t have any investigative powers above that merit dimension. Is that right?

F. Spencer: Yes, sorry. I should have gone on to say that…. The first part of my response was related to the audit activity. Of course, we do accept requests from employees for a review of particular staffing decisions where they’ve been unsuccessful. In those cases, definitely, we respond to the requester at the same time as we advise the deputy minister or the organization head about the outcome of the investigation.
[ Page 2848 ]

Once I’ve come to a decision and provided that information back to the deputy head or the organization, no, I’m no longer involved in that.

E. Foster: I might have missed this in your presentation. Under your professional services…. Although the number is not very high, the percentage is extremely high. Was that to cover outside audits?

F. Spencer: Under STOB 60, professional services? That covers a number of things. For instance, it’s our legal advice — we contract for that; our website hosting; annual report preparation; statistical support; our audit advisory committee; and some other things. Those contracts are approximately $60,000 in that number that’s in there. The rest of the number, which is around $80,000 or so, relates to the cost of contracting with external auditors to conduct the audit activity.

E. Foster: That’s not a tremendous amount of money, then, although the percentage is high.

F. Spencer: Yeah, percentage in terms of my overall budget. But no, it’s not a tremendous amount of money. I think we get very good value for the money.

I just want to make sure I heard that correctly. You said there was an increase in the number of examinations you did, but the end result was not a change in the appointment. You described an increase in the numbers but said it didn’t result in a lack of merit in the appointment at the end.

C. James (Deputy Chair): I just wanted to make sure. Is that process, then, mainly? Is it process issues that occurred during the time period that didn’t actually change the end result? If I’ve got that right, how is your office looking at addressing that? Is it more education for the people who are doing the interviews?

F. Spencer: Yes, that’s exactly right. What we found were more appointments with concerns, as I’ve said, that could range from just missing documentation to ways that people have conducted the selection process. When we examined the process in its entirety, the outcome of the process was unchanged by those errors.

We call those “merit with exception.” We use those as a warning signal to managers, to hiring managers, to organization heads in the Public Service Agency. “Here are some problematic practices that we’re seeing.” If they continue, they could very well lead to appointments that are not based on merit.

We report those, as I’ve said, to the organization heads so they can see what those are. They can determine if there’s action that needs to taken within their organizations. As I’ve said, I’m very pleased with their response to the reports that we provide. They take it very seriously. They do, in fact, address them not only with the hiring manager that was involved but often within their organizations as a whole.

We also talk to the Public Service Agency about that. They can see the collective across those 321 appointments that we’ve looked at, and they can identify where they might need to change policy or where a new practice that they may have introduced is problematic. I think that’s a real value, and they see that — problems they may not have foreseen when they introduced a practice to, perhaps, try to streamline the process. We highlight that for them, and then they can make those changes and, hopefully, proceed in the future.

C. James (Deputy Chair): That’s great. Thank you. I would agree. I think the opportunity for learning through those processes, for everybody who is doing hiring, is critical, not simply the individual case where there was a challenge. It’s something that everybody can learn from.

E. Foster: We met with the conflict commissioner earlier this morning, and he commented on the fact that he does conflict resolution or advice to other governments, school boards, local government and so on. Does your office do that, or are you strictly the provincial public service?

F. Spencer: Just within the B.C. Public Service. I don’t have the mandate, and I honestly…. He has an education component, I think, to his mandate that I don’t have. So I don’t have the mandate, and really, I wouldn’t have the capacity.

We do meet with colleagues from time to time from other organizations either at the federal level…. Some other countries, when they come to visit, come and talk to us about what we do. So we share information, but we don’t actually engage in active conflict resolution or audit activity or anything like that.

Seeing none, thank you very much for taking the time. I appreciate it. Enjoy the rest of your day.

S. Hamilton (Chair): The committee will have a brief recess. We’ll charge those plates with a little bit of food, and we’ll come back and convene in about ten minutes.

S. Hamilton (Chair): In order to deliberate on the budgets of the statutory offices, I will look for a motion to go in camera. Moved by Dan, seconded.

S. Hamilton (Chair): We’re in regular session. Looking to the floor for a motion.

E. Foster: I move that the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services approve and adopt the report entitled Report on the Budget 2017 Consultations, as amended today, and further, that the committee authorize the Chair and Deputy Chair to work with committee staff to finalize minor editorial changes to complete the supporting text.

C. James (Deputy Chair): I move a motion that the Chair of Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services deposit a copy of the report entitled Report on the Budget 2017 Consultations with the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly, and further, that upon resumption of the sitting of the House or the next following session, the Chair shall present the report to the Legislative Assembly at the earliest available opportunity.

D. Ashton: Quickly, I just want to say, not even for the record, thanks to everybody I’ve had the opportunity to….

D. Ashton: I’m sure the Chair will re-emphasize, but it’s absolutely been a pleasure working with everybody — Jenny, you too, if you’re still listening.

D. Ashton: Especially to staff. I can’t forget the staff behind the glass in there that are patiently with us on a continual basis.

S. Hamilton (Chair): Thank you. I’d like to also reiterate that. It’s been, what, the middle of September? We all came together. This is an incredible committee to work with. I’ve said it before. I’ve said it publicly. I’ve said it on the record. We have worked very, very hard to gain consensus as we go forward. I think we work exceptionally well together. I consider everyone in this room my friend, and I appreciate all the hard work you put into the effort of getting us to where we all now. Thank you all.

Access to on-line versions of the report of proceedings (Hansard)
and webcasts of committee proceedings is available on the Internet.

Chair:	Wm. Scott Hamilton (Delta North BC Liberal)
Deputy Chair:	Carole James (Victoria–Beacon Hill NDP)
Members:	Dan Ashton (Penticton BC Liberal)
	Robin Austin (Skeena NDP)
	Eric Foster (Vernon-Monashee BC Liberal)
	Simon Gibson (Abbotsford-Mission BC Liberal)
	George Heyman (Vancouver-Fairview NDP)
	Jennifer Rice (North Coast NDP)
	Jackie Tegart (Fraser-Nicola BC Liberal)
	John Yap (Richmond-Steveston BC Liberal)
Clerks:	Kate Ryan-Lloyd
	Susan Sourial

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SELECT STANDING COMMITTEE ON
FINANCE AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES