Mr. Speaker, I want to pick up where I left off with my questions to the Premier in regard to hiring. I just don’t want people out there in the public wasting their time applying to positions that we’re not deeming appropriate or where they’re not going to fit into our strategic initiatives, like I heard the Premier say earlier.
I’d like to ask the Premier: what positions currently are not deemed appropriate or fitting into our strategic initiatives, so that people aren’t applying for them?
Mr. Speaker, we’ve heard the Member in the past talk about the growth of our government and the growth of our employees. I don’t have a handle today on just what positions, what areas of departments, are not going to fit with our initiatives. We’re undertaking that work.
The jobs are still going out there for areas that we need to fill. There hasn’t been a job-hiring freeze. The process still goes, but before a final hire happens, deputies are working on initiatives with their senior staff, bringing them back to our government and seeing how they fit with the cost-saving measures we’re making as well as the reinvestments, to see if they would align, as a preventative sort of step instead of having to deal with it after the fact.
Mr. Speaker, I guess the fact of the matter for me is that we weren’t consulted on that. I listened to the Premier state to my colleague Mr. Menicoche that no instructions had been given in terms of beginning reductions. When he was answering my questions earlier, it was obvious to me that he said that instructions had been given to department heads to begin an exercise where they would see where hiring fit in terms of the strategic plan.
So again, Mr. Speaker, it’s a bit complex. It’s a bit unsettling for me. I’d like the Premier to maybe explain exactly what instructions have been given to the departments.
Mr. Speaker, let’s not mix the words of one response with another. We know instructions have been given to departments to meet their targets. Instructions have not been given to departments — let’s separate that now; instructions have not been given to departments — to begin reductions April 1. We have not made that decision at this level. We haven’t brought those forward as part of a business plan as of yet. Until we get that level of approval, we can’t be going out and giving that direction to the public service.
What does happen as a normal course of business, for example, Mr. Speaker, is that when a program has been sunsetted already, when departments knew that their three-year funding was running out, whether it was part of a federal transfer or a program that a department may have initiated a number of years ago, then it’s normal business as we proceed. It’s not part of the reduction scenario or cost-saving measures that we’re taking as a government overall.
Mr. Speaker, I’m having a little bit of trouble understanding the logic where the government tells departments that they’re going to be okay hiring on a case-by-case basis in an effort to achieve reductions. We don’t have to wait until April 1st to figure that out; that happened last week. That exercise is already happening. It’s at play in the government departments. The instruction was given by the government without consulting the Regular Members.
I’d like to again ask the Premier: what specific instructions have been given to the departments?
Mr. Speaker, I see the path this is going down: that as a new government, as Premier, we’ve not shared any information with Members, that we’ve been withholding information. I’ve taken a large number of steps to be as open as possible with Members, to share the direction we’re going in.
In fact, early in January I offered up the opportunity to see where we’ve looked at setting these targets. We’ve shared information. Is it complicated? Is it because the Member just disagrees with where we’re going? I’m not sure.
What we were trying to do is prevent the reverse. When we heard that departments were beginning to shut down positions and not hire, we hadn’t given a direction on a hiring freeze or anything of that nature, and that is not in place.
The policies are all still in place and being used for the jobs that are out there and being advertised. What we’ve asked for is an extra level of scrutiny, in a sense, with the deputy ministers as they’re doing their work to have a final look at that to ensure that we’re not going down a path that might six months later, when we come to our May/June budget session, end up laying off some employees that just were hired six months prior.
Mr. Speaker, that wasn’t the path I was going down, but the Premier said it himself. Whether the information is being shared or not — we could debate that for a long time. I have a differing view of things than the Premier does, obviously.
Again, I just wanted to ask the question: are we being clear and consistent with the instructions that are being given to the departments? Are all departments being treated equally on the instructions that are being given to them? Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, the result, as the Member has pointed out, of the additional process we’ve undertaken at this stage is to be clear, to be consistent with every department, and I believe that they are getting the message. Thank you.
