Thank you, Mr. Chair. I move that proposed subsection 27(3) in clause 4 of Bill 30 be amended by striking out “to any position in the public service” and substituting “to any vacant position in the public service”. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. Committee, a motion is on the floor. The motion is in order. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wish to speak on the motion.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. We’ll go to Mr. Dolynny first. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I don’t want to steal the Minister’s thunder. As a committee member, I support the objective of minimizing any disruption to the continuity of employment for affected employees to reduce their stress for these individuals during a time of uncertainty in their lives. Nonetheless, there is particular wording that exists in this section, Section 27(3) of the Public Service Act, and it remains an amendment contemplated in this Bill 30. I find this clause very troubling.
The cause of concern is the wording which gives the Minister the authority to appoint the employee without any competition to any position in the public service to which he or she is qualified. Concern with a reference to any position is echoed in a written submission received by the Northwest Territories Teachers’ Association during the public review of the bill.
Some committee members share my concern that the failure of the legislation to place reasonable limitations on the nature by which the Minister may appoint provides the Minister with enormous authority. This authority could potentially lead to the appointment of an individual identified for layoff to a position that is already occupied by an incumbent.
During the clause-by-clause review of the bill, the Minister indicated that the department intends to undertake an overhaul of the Public Service Act, which was described by his officials as outdated, within the next few years. While this is very welcome news, we should not wait until a future review to amend this troubling wording in the legislation, which is now a problem before us.
The Minister was asked about the possibility of including the word vacant, as in any vacant position, as a way of more accurately defining the nature of positions that might identify for those who are being laid off. The Minister expressed resistance to this suggestion, indicating that it would unreasonably limit the department’s options for finding alternative positions for its affected employees, and that was echoed equally here today.
The Minister further explained that, on occasion, positions may be double filled for training purposes or for succession planning when the incumbent has already signaled his or her intention to leave the position. Again, this was echoed today on the floor of the House.
In the end, I find the defence arguments of the Minister and the department of poor quality in justifying their status quo position of the Minister’s consistency of power. In fact, the summary of the bill, as pointed out by my colleague Mr. Bromley, reminds us the spirit and the intent of the bill used the term vacant position in its summary, yet this is purposely removed from the bill itself and we need to ask why. To the concern of an incumbent would never be displaced by a layoff appointment, let me remind Members the removal of an incumbent under the process of constructive dismissal is such a situation which could apply in today’s debate.
The problem needs to be fixed now to give comfort to all GNWT employees that their positions will not be usurped and to accommodate someone who has been identified for a layoff. We all know the phrase “devil is in the details” and I can assure Members of this House this is exactly the road we are about to embark on by not including the qualifier “of any vacant position.” History in the law will judge our action or inaction in due course.
So at this time, I’d ask Members to consider and weigh all options on this amendment and to not pass judgment until there has been full disclosure for consideration. Mr. Chair, I will be seeking for a recorded vote. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. To the motion. Mr. Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would reiterate again the clause that we’re changing, one term, that’s what the legislative proposal is, a term of changing in Section 27(3), changing from a person that is laid off to a person that’s affected by a layoff. This is the reason that we are here. In order to change this overall Public Service, which says “any position” to “vacant position,” we’d have to take this legislation to the union and we would have to consult and we would have to do further in-depth review of the Public Service Act.
What we’re doing here is changing one small clause. This is not part of what we’re trying to change. Also, it does limit, as the Member says, the government’s ability if we add the word vacant. It does limit our ability. It doesn’t say we don’t place layoff persons into vacant positions, it says any position.
What the change would do that’s being contemplated by the Members would change to vacant positions only. So it would eliminate any possibilities where an individual could be ready to retire and we’re looking to have another individual in the public service that has been affected by layoff be the successor, putting that person in. It eliminates our ability to transfer the knowledge from a person that may be leaving the public service through retirement or the various ways of attrition that occur in the public service.
So if we’re going to do this, then we must take this back to a consultation process and we would change the legislative proposal. We can’t make this change on the floor here today. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Next I have Mr. Abernethy.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Prior to becoming an MLA I worked in Human Resources within the Government of the Northwest Territories for almost 13 years and in that time I participated in many staffing actions. I was the lead staffing officer on many staffing actions. I worked on many, many labour relations issues and I worked on a number of duty to accommodate issues.
This legislation that is before you is dealing with individuals where we have a duty and a legal obligation to accommodate employees who have either been laid off or have medical issues, that we have to work with them to find a way to keep them in the public service.
This clause, this change is very troubling, because when we’re trying to accommodate individuals, when we have a legal obligation to work with our employees to find them meaningful employment in these situations, we have to have all options available to us as a government, absolutely.
When I worked on duty to accommodate – and I know this is true today – the obvious first step is to look at vacant positions that the individual might be suitable for. You want those individuals to go into those because we want to employ them as much as possible. Sometimes there aren’t direct or obvious lineups, so we have to look at all options.
In certain situations, individuals give us much heads-up that they are planning to retire. I’ve had individuals approach me when I was a staffing officer and say, hey, I’m 55, I want out of here. But we need to work with somebody to make sure that we help them get the skills they need or do some succession planning to bring them in place.
In these situations where we’re talking about putting someone in a position that’s filled, what we’re talking about is individuals have almost always identified themselves, almost always have indicated that they’re leaving and are hoping to be involved in the succession planning or development of individuals. This gives us a tool to work with our employees, work with our bargaining unit, the UNW, work with all parties to find reasonable and appropriate means to move people around in the public service when we have a duty to accommodate.
If you take out the word “vacant” or, rather, insert the word “vacant,” it means our ability to accommodate is going to be significantly reduced. We are going to lose our ability to work with those employees. We’re going to lose the ability to find meaningful employment for some of our employees.
I understand the desire. I have to say this is going to significantly limit our ability to work with the employees that I have heard people say they want to protect. We want to work with our employees; we need to work with our employees and there must be options. Removing this or inserting this is taking away reasonable options that have worked, and will continue to work, in good faith with our bargaining unit, our employees and our professionals. So I will be voting against this and I will be happy to stand up and oppose this.
Thank you, Mr. Abernethy. To the motion. Mr. Blake.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I too, unfortunately, can’t support this motion. I see the benefits, actually, of direct appointing people and also double filling positions to job shadow, if you will. I saw it here this week. It’s a good opportunity for someone moving into a position and also sharing the knowledge that experienced people have in that position and transferring that knowledge on. It only benefits someone new to a position. I’ve seen it over the last number of years.
Also, on the other hand, when the government is in the position to direct appoint someone with years of experience that they’ve learned off of a number of people in their field or department over the years, and some of our Ministers have done the same. Moving forward, I think this is a very valuable piece of power that we give to the Ministers. They are very precise in their decision-making. I support this moving forward. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Blake. To the motion. Mr. Moses.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. There are a lot of good arguments for and against the amendment before us. There are a lot of options out there. We put this and we do have a lot of vacant positions within the GNWT. We see it during business plans. We most recently got on a topic during one of our last sessions, but we also developed this Regional Recruitment Program where we can actually help individuals succeed and go up into a higher level within their departments. I don’t see that, but whether or not that’s being used or utilized are questions that I had on this earlier in the year. We are supposed to have a bunch of GNWT employees identified under this program, when I think there was one at the time I asked the first question. I think we got up to maybe five or six half a year later when it was supposed to be into the program.
I did take a quick look at the Staff Retention Policy, and under one of the principles it does discuss layoff and it says, “The GNWT recognizes that in some circumstances layoff is unavoidable and is the only viable option for the employer and the employee.” I think this amendment, making it to a vacant position, would also help with that continuity and that any position I know that would, as Mr. Dolynny put it, put our employees that currently work for us at ease, knowing that the Minister at any time cannot look at any position in the GNWT but just the vacant ones.
Under the policy statement under the Staff Retention Policy, it also states that fair treatment of employees and organizational restructuring is necessary, should be taken into consideration and the value of continuity of employees in territorial public service. As I said, I’ve seen some of these kinds of actions before. As the Minister stated earlier, he worked for the government, he worked in the public service. I did too, and I’ve seen some of these direct appointments being utilized and, actually, employees not wanting to work in that department before. I’ve seen it and I still see it today, where the atmosphere in the working environment hasn’t been that dampened or poisoned, in a sense, because certain individuals were direct appointed into positions that should have gone up for competition.
I think the amendment that would be made here would get fair treatment not only for those employees that are looking for continuity but it would give fair treatment for employees who are already in positions who want to work. I know some Ministers might not be agreeing with that, but like I said, I worked in public service before and I’ve seen it and I’ve seen how it has affected the departments.
As I said, I will happily stand up to support this amendment because I’ve seen it with employees that I worked with before. I’ll be happy and willing to stand up, like my colleague, but in this case stand up for the employees who are already filling our positions, in support of this motion. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Moses. To the motion. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will be supporting the motion. I can appreciate the perspective the folks on Cabinet have to be able to do this. I did go to the Government Operations meetings to hear this out. I understand about the continuity of a position. I would just think, deep down, there must be a better way to do this. I’m not actually against direct appointments; I just want transparency on them personally. I think what this does is we don’t know what’s actually… There’s a lot of vagueness to this.
This is our opportunity by being clear, honest and fair to all around. If we say vacant position, then no one has anything to worry.
I know people are saying today that isn’t how it’s going to work, but yet we can’t guarantee that once laws are in place. The application is we have to trust people in the future someday to apply it in a manner that we thought it was designed for. Am I of the mind that this is going to be a problem all the time? Probably not. Am I of the mind that it will happen? Yes, it will happen. If we don’t clearly specify on how something is to work, my goodness, we have to be very prescriptive when we do these things and not allow them to be enabled in a manner that people can do this.
The only other thing I would add to this particular discussion, and there’s been a fair bit of it and I welcome hearing people’s perspectives, but the big issue I have on top of that is the fact that there is no clarity, there is no scrutiny and the fact that all the power is in the Cabinet’s hands. Now, woe is us when we hear the constant line that these are private matters and not for public. But I’ve often said all direct appointments should be something we should be proud of. I do agree that there are lots of occasions why they should happen, but I feel that it’s unfair to the public service and it’s unfair to the bureaucracy at large. I’m really speaking, when I say public service, of those in the unit, sorry, because they see someone getting a job walking in on that Monday and they wonder: how the heck did they get that job? First thing they think is, well, they must know somebody. It’s that type of perception.
The famous ointment is called transparency on this one. It would cure all questions. If people knew who was being appointed, they knew what reasons they were being appointed, it makes sense. In some communities it’s tough to put somebody in a job because we can’t find them, but we could find people who could do the job who just need a fair opportunity. In cases like that, I am very supportive of transition, training opportunities, where we work with people to put folks in jobs where we know they have the ability to step up to the plate. They may not have the university degree; they may not have the technical training. Sometimes we can look past those because we know they are darn good at what they can do and we see promise in them to do those things. They just don’t have the three, four, six, eight years, whatever the case may be, to run out somewhere to go get those types of training and then hope there’s a job when they come back. There are lots of ways to make things happen.
Again, my issue is about transparency. This at least provides some confidence from this side of the House. I understand that Cabinet doesn’t like change from Members’ points of view when they have decided that this is the way it is. When we get it in writing, it is pretty much done from a perspective of negotiation, and my comfort level is that I would like to know, that when we leave this building today, if Cabinet has now downloaded it’s responsibility of redirecting these things to the Minister and it’s being redirected down to somebody else in the bureaucracy such as maybe the deputy minister, that at least I know somebody is ensuring that it is going to a vacant position that we’re transferring somebody over to it, and at the end of the day, I don’t have to worry that there are any shenanigans going one. The bottom line is, it’s the smallest amount of transparency that we can hope for by guaranteeing that no one will be trumped, no position will be at risk, and if it’s a vacant one, like I said, we should be proud of these things. A lot of times they make a lot of sense. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. To the motion. Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to thank my colleague Mr. Dolynny for bringing this motion to Committee of the Whole. It’s very small; it’s a one word motion. It has a lot of different viewpoints on it.
I wanted to say to Mr. Dolynny, this motion here certainly looks at the government as a whole and the appointments of the positions in HR. Certainly hearing the Minister talk about this one word here then means it has to go back to the unions for discussion, because the unions are part of it, and we’re going to come to have that kind of a delay here. That’s what I’m getting. The unions are part of this. That’s my understanding. If I’m wrong, correct me.
The issue of job shadowing is a good thing. Double filling is what you call it. It’s double double at Tim Horton’s but this is double filling. It’s a good thing because there are people in the Sahtu that are going to retire and I always ask, we have a young population that want to work, I have even asked one of the Ministers before, if we could have somebody job shadow somebody else because they have wealth of knowledge in that department. I would like to get a young person in there that’s in Aurora College right now, or in one of the small communities, to say they have an interest in that area, if could look at that, doing job shadowing. Increase that percentage of Aboriginal hire in the region.
I think there are processes and procedures, checks and balances. It is the integrity of the department, the integrity of the Minister how we do this. That is sometimes what gets questioned.
I would like to see those numbers from within the Government of the Northwest Territories increase in the Sahtu region. Bring them up. How long have we had the numbers that low? You may see a small increase, so anything we can do. I think the government is hearing some of our small communities talk about having fair representation of our government employees representing people in the regions. That’s a must. If I have 79 students in the Aurora College or any of the Aurora College learning centres, by golly, we have to tell them that there is hope there. Why do we tell them to go to school anyhow, to collect income assistance? Is that what we’re telling them?
Through any means, if it’s ethical, a high degree of integrity and that is on the Minister’s plate. You know, if there is any stuff that we have suspicions, then the Ministers have to live with that. That’s where the buck stops. But I’m fighting for my people, the ones who are in school, to look at job shadowing. There are some people that they are going to be leaving their jobs and they are going to be feeling sad. To have someone else come in and work with them, I think that’s a good thing.
So positions, yes, that’s what I’m hoping for and I think the department is well aware of it right now through this side of the House here, what we are looking for. It is the Ministers who have that added responsibility. As you said, I want this job and we voted you in for that job, to a higher degree. We are held on this side for accountability and transparency, to say, is this it?
So this motion here gets you to wonder: are we going to increase the numbers? You heard us. Is it ethical? Does it have integrity? Is it solid? Is it process?
One of the Cabinet Ministers talked about legally, I think that you have to look at the moral issue. Morally is it okay, is it good? That’s why you have a lawyer, to look at it legally, make sure all the checks and balances are there. But as an MLA, it’s a moral obligation and that’s very frightful, making sure our people in the Sahtu, the northern people, that they can have a fair shot in special circumstances.
I have wanted to say, Mr. Dolynny, thanks for bringing forward this motion, to have me think about it. I think it’s a good, valid motion and at this time, right now, it has to be looked at carefully and I think that I’m going to agree with my colleague Mr. Blake to not support the motion because I think this motion is going to be something that’s in place that’s going to help my people. I am going to leave it to the Ministers. I am voting against this motion and I want to see that if it’s going to help our people. That’s all I want to say. We need it; we need it in the region. I hope our people in the department are listening and are going to be working hard to increase those numbers in the Sahtu region. Mahsi cho.
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. To the motion. Premier McLeod.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to this motion. I just have a few comments to make. I guess some of the points that were made against priority hiring, that’s a policy of this government where government has significant changes. We change organizations on a regular basis. To hear that some Members will stand up loudly against priority hiring concerns me.
We have priority hiring to protect the employees of the government. If we don’t have priority hiring, it means that if we change our organization, it means that we will have to lay these people off, and that’s a concern for me.
Also, the fact that this motion does not appear to support succession planning, if we have no vacant positions, then we will not be able to provide succession planning other than to perhaps create additional positions. Similarly, with duty to accommodate, we’ve heard in the past we have too many vacant positions and we should get rid of vacant positions. Now, in order to fulfill our legal responsibilities for duty to accommodate, what if there are no vacant positions? Then we won’t be able to legally fulfill our requirements.
I guess most concerning is the fact that we’re working to have a representative public service. Direct appointments is a tool that we can use to do that, and I think that with this motion that would seriously limit our ability to have a representative public service. I will be voting against it, and this side of the House will be voting against this motion.
Thank you, Premier McLeod. To the motion. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, colleagues, on both sides of the House here for their comments and I appreciate the Member bringing this forward for discussion and debate. I think there have been good points made on both sides and, ultimately, it really does depend on performance of the Minister and the department with respect to how well the intent, as the summary states, to fill vacant positions is actually accomplished. I think there have been some arguments made for having flexibility. I think really what we’re dealing with here is a matter of trust and the lack of trust, especially when it comes to legal stuff and the law. The law is a pretty flat, sort of, unemotional thing, and has to be, but it doesn’t always give direction on intent and can be used. Some of the arguments were vacuous, I think. No vacant positions and should get rid of vacant positions and stuff like this.
I think committee has certainly been very concerned about the direct appointments and the overuse of direct appointments. I think that’s clear, and I hope the Minister has heard that loud and clear. To me, what’s needed here, whichever way this falls, is some serious commitment from the Minister to monitor the situation, for committee to ensure that the Minister monitors the situation and reports back on the use of this tool so that we can have a basis when we go forward with the review to make any corrections needed. On that basis, I’ll be abstaining.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley. To the motion. Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just want to give a brief explanation for the action that I’m about to take. I, as well, have listened to both sides of this argument and I am part of the committee that discussed this at great length. I am satisfied with the failsafes, I guess, that have been expressed by the government, and I do not feel the fear, I guess, that my colleagues do passing this bill without the word “vacant” in there. However, that said, I don’t feel that I can vote against my colleagues, so I will be abstaining.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. To the motion. Mr. Miltenberger.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m going into my 40th year both in working for the government and being in this Legislature, and I spent a significant amount of time when I was in government as a manager, and I have been a Minister for a while, and I can tell you that the direct appointment tool is absolutely critical for meeting the objectives of this Legislature. I can tell you that if we were sitting here and we had every position filled and no vacancies, we could be having, maybe, a legitimate conversation about direct appointments. But when we’re sitting here with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of vacancies and the issue is not how do we get these jobs filled, but it’s how do we deal with the deep suspicions of some of the MLAs and tie the hands as much as possible of the government to prevent us from, in fact, filling those positions, it’s somewhat problematic.
So in ENR, as the Minister, I make very judicious but extensive use of direct appointments and I can show you the statistics about having a representative workforce. It’s a critical tool and we shouldn’t be afraid of it. We have tons of checks and balances, and the bottom line is we look at our vacancy rates, we want to get our population growing and we want economic activities in our communities. Half of our hundreds and hundreds of vacancies are in Yellowknife, the other half are out in the regions in communities and we’re spending tens upon tens of millions of dollars with housing and other incentives to get people out there and yet we’re sitting around here today saying, but don’t do this. It’s a tool that we need to meet the direction that the Legislature has set.
So you have to look at what’s the goal of this tool. There’s no overuse of direct appointments. We don’t use enough direct appointments. If we used enough of everything, we’d have our jobs filled. So I think people have to sort of put aside their suspicion and their conspiracy theories that somehow the government is working away behind the scenes so they can appoint all their friends or they can do things contrary to all the laws and policies that guide us with the all the checks and balances that are there. We want to come up with a system where we have full employment, where we have all these jobs filled. So let’s not tie the hands needlessly of government and the ability to hire because of the suspicion of some Members. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Miltenberger. To the motion.
