Globe and Mail- Ottawa, we have a problem: the federal public service
A few days later, we were told that federal government call centres, with an annual price tag of $368-million, are not meeting reasonable service standards, notwithstanding seeing the number of full-time staff going from 2,651 to 5,610 over an eight-year period. And a few days after that, Canadians were told that there is a profound malaise in Canada’s diplomatic service.
The writer of this piece, Don Savoie, teaches at a small, nothing university in Moncton, New Brunswick. But despite that, he has written many books on our federal government, and knows his stuff. I have read nearly all his books and he is a thorough researcher. Everything he says here is spot on.
“Hacking away at the federal public service out of frustration is not the answer.”
You call that spot on?
I saw that last sentence, and it says everything. This is a Big Government guy. There is nothing in this guy’s mind that can’t be improved with a little regulation.
The true answer is to STARVE THEM OUT. Nothing will work until Canadians are freed from the tyranny of obscene taxation that we all live under. They take much more than half your money, and that’s if you work for a living. Its much worse for the poor. More like 2/3rds for the poor. (Add up all those sales-taxes and fees, Lefties. See what’s left of that $15 minimum wage at the end.)
We do not hack away at them, or even decimate them, which means removing one in ten. All we do is cut their budgets. In half, to start with. Then 10% every year after that, for at least 20 years. At ALL levels of government, federal, provincial, county and town. Twenty years of cutting them down to something more like what we need, then we can talk about strategic applications of regulation to make life better.
Maybe a good start would be to reduce the government to the size it was at the end of World War Two. Just as an initial cut, you know, with the goal being to get back to pre-World War One levels of government employment and oversight.
Here in Canada what’s important is all the unimportant stuff.. A nation of inefficient Nazi’s that were blessed with enough natural resources that we actually believed our own BS.. Harsh words..
My sister works for the feds, she rarely goes into work and seems to spend her working hours making personal phone calls while whining no one goes into work anymore including her. We could fire half the snivel servants and not notice a difference.
Rose, it’s actually much worse than that. In any organization the square root of the number of employees does 80% of the work on average. Governments are below average.
Due to an increased volume of calls … blah blah blah. It’s not just government call centers it’s every damn one everywhere.
ha ha ha!!! my phone provider (the irony, a COMMUNICATIONS enterprise) been putting that in front of the customer service response for 2 years more or less.
‘average wait times’, well duh. if the ‘average’ been that bad this long, time to hire more agents. but thats overhead. better to take it out on the hapless cussomer . . . .
You could probably outsource all these people to India, since the Service Canada Scam call centers there provide better service…
Malaise? How about “lazy leeches”?
My first thought was, how exactly does one notice this? Do they yearn? Any pining?
“We know that the size of the federal public service has grown by 24 per cent over the last eight years and spending on outside consultants has increased by a third over the past five years. But growth in the size of the federal government and the scale of government spending has not improved access to government programs and services. ”
The writer of the article makes the mistake of the assumption that increasing the number of people employed by the government will magically “improve access” when the point is to increase the number of people reliant on the government as a power center in Canada
The federal PS is a colossal thief, stealing the money of Canadians to enrich themselves.
Rose writes that 50% could go and no one would notice.
I’d put it at 75%.
all services should be at the point required , no where else. parks canada is the worst with 0ver 60 % located in Ottawa
I was gonna say 90%…
You’re probably right – I was being Christmasy
Does profound malaise mean lazy bastard who doesn’t want to work?
I met some philosophers in Kuala Lumpur who were profound Malays, but I’m not sure they’re who he has in mind.
What is going on in Ottawa you ask?
Gotta minute or two?
It’s a sickening government/corporate town where pretty much everyone is dependent on government or government services. The people working in public services don’t care about the work per se. All they’re thinking about is how many more years they have left before they start collecting their pensions.
I can tell you stories!
A cynical way to understate the unemployment rate, not counting the malevolent multipliers flowing out.
Perfectly natural in this technological era, with many thousands of swivel servants retiring en masse, that full time federal government employment would rise by a quarter. No? But it sounded so good in the seminar room.
Oh, it’s the opposite of that, aka duplicitous dystopia to support a binary world of 1/0 right/wrong? So what?
IOW another genius LPC power move, buy off the public sector unions, feign economic growth; but most of all take incomplete information to the taxpayer bank, assume authority and dissuade dangerous dissidence, aka MAGA.
Telling the people only they are fit to govern, that they are working for them, while refusing to consult them.
If you boss doesn’t care about his job, and his boss doesn’t either, and the whole organization is full of not serious, small minded, short term thinkers, right to the top,eventually it infects the whole organization. Elon Musk speaks to that, anyone in the workplace instinctively understands this. No surprise at all
H
notwithstanding seeing the number of full-time staff going from 2,651 to 5,610 over an eight-year period.
And therein lies the problem. Read the mythical man-month.
And when you do connect to a federal servant, it would be nice if they could speak English fluently!
The new middle class.
Increased by 25% ..Just as Dear Leader promised them.
Just remember that fawning,cheering crowd of “nonpartisan” government employees,when dear Leader was first elected.
What kind of stupid,would believe the tax payers should get better service,with more minions?
That is not how Bureaucracy works.
If you can call what they do working.
The “help” Canadians get from our civil service is toxic.
Can Ahh Duh is dying at the hands of these “helpers”.
Faster.
Harder.
WEXIT.
My experience with the feds and their call service is you call, get told there is nothing that can be done, call, get told nothing can be done, and then after 3-5 iteration you get lucky and hit someone who actually knows how things work and wants to help you. Then things happen at lightning speed and your issue is over.
Here in Florida working from home takes on a different meaning…here are two examples:
I spent winters at an RV park in mid Florida. In our park we have an active civil servant from Quebec, he chose our park because we have hi-speed internet to each and every site, this is his third year here. He does find it inconvenient having to return to the actual office once a month for a couple of days.
The second example is an American friend who likes to spend time in Costa Rica, usually January and February. He stays in an area there saturated with Canadians….many still gainfully employed in the Canadian civil service….he rents an apartment from one who is a mid level functionary with Agriculture Canada, his wife for Health and Safety Canada.
Good work if you can get it.
DONALD SAVOIE… “No private-sector manager goes to work with nearly as many shadows on their shoulders (as government managers).” Nuts.
Here’s the solution: since the private sector provides 100% of government revenues, government ‘workers’ need a 10 year moratorium on voting, ie; every citizen whos income is derived from the tax-payer (and therefore contributes nothing to the tax base) including doctors/politicians/dog-catchers/may choose between their job or their vote. Alternatively private sector tax-payers get two votes for every government ‘worker’.