By Nick Mann | 11 December 2012
The Canadian Parliament needs to be given more details about planned federal job cuts so it can gauge their effect on services, an independent budget watchdog said today.
A total of 19,200 full-time equivalent roles are set to be cut between 2012/13 and 2014/15 as part of the $5.2bn savings package in finance minister Jim Flaherty’s March budget. In The fiscal impact of federal personnel expenses, Canadian parliamentary budget officer Kevin Page said this would continue a downward trend in the federal workforce from the 380,000 peak reached in 2010/11.
It would also ‘maintain a stable trajectory for the short term’ for the federal wage bill, he said. In 2011/12, federal staff costs amounted to $43.8bn, or 38.1% of all federal government spending – equivalent to 2.55% of Canada’s gross domestic product. This gives an average remuneration of $114,100 per full-time employee.
Page noted, however, that the Parliament was not being given the information it needed to hold the government to account over changes announced in the 2010, 2011 and 2012 budgets.
This ‘lack of transparency’ meant the government had not provided a ‘baseline’ multiyear plan for the reductions in staff numbers. Page had requested that Parliament be given access to the job cuts forecast by individual departments and agencies but this had to be met.
‘As such, parliamentarians do not have the resources with which to determine areas of priority for resource distribution and the effects of the distribution on services provided to Canadians,’ the report said.
Page also highlighted a lack of timely information on exactly how money is spent and efficiencies that are being made. Current reporting requirements for departments and agencies meant it could take around 18 months for personnel costs and employment figures to be released.
‘Were information available on an interim basis, parliamentarians would be able to respond with enhanced effectiveness and succeed in providing greater insight into how Canada spent $43.8bn in 2011/12, or 2.55% of its GDP,’ Page noted.
Departments and agencies should include an account of personnel expenses in their annual reports on human resources strategies, the report says. This could ‘provide a clear assessment of which programmes will be prioritised given current budgetary restraints’, it explained.
To this end, the government could also expand its monthly finance report, the Fiscal monitor, to include aspects of spending on personnel, it added.
