Manitoba Hansard — 5 July 1993 (Sitting 94B, 35th Legislature, 4th Session)

35-4-94b

Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)

MG-8048 Fourth Session -T hirty-Fifth Legislature of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba DEBATES and PROCEEDINGS (HANSARD) 42 Elizabeth II Published under the authority of The Honourable Denis C. Rocsn Speaker VOL. XLII No. 948 • 8 p.m., MONDAY, JULY 5,1993 ISSN 0542-5492

MANITOBA LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY Thirty-Fifth Legls:lature Members, Constituencies and Political Affili ation NAME ALCOCK, Reg ASHTON, Steve BARRETT, Becky CARST AIR S, Sharon CERIL LI , Marianne CHOMIAK, Dave CUMMIN GS, Glen, Hon. DACQUAY, Louise DERKACH, Leonard, Hon. DEW AR, Gregory DOER, Gary DOWNEY, James, Hon. DRIEDGER, Albert, Hon. DUCHARME, Gerry, Hon. EDWARDS, Paul ENNS, Harry, Hon. ERNST, Jim, Hon. EVANS, Clif EVANS, Leonar d S. FILMON, Gary, Hon. FINDL AY, Glen, Hon. FRIESEN, Jean GAUDRY, Neil GIL LESH AMMER, Harold, Hon. GRAY, Avis HELWER, Edward R.

HICKES, George LAMOUREUX, Kevin LA THLIN, Oscar LAURENDEAU, Marcel MALOWAY, Jim MANNESS, Clayton, Hon. MARTINDALE, Doug McALPINE, Gerry McCRAE, James, Hon. MciNTOS H, Linda, Hon. MITCHELSON, Bonnie, Hon. ORC HARD, Donald, Hon. PALLISTER, Brian PENNER, Jack PLOHMAN, John PRAZNIK, Darr en, Hon. REID, Daryl REIMER, Jack RENDER, Shirley ROCAN, Denis, Hon. ROSE, Bob SANTOS, Conrad STEFANSON, Eric, Hon. ST ORIE, Jerry SVEINSON, Ben VODREY, Rosemary, Hon. WASYL YCIA-LEIS, Judy WOWC HUK, Rosann Vacant Vacant Vacant CONSTITUENCY OsbornEI Thom pson Welli ngton River HE1ights Radisson Kildonan Ste.

Rose Seine River Roblin-Fiussell Selkirk Concordia Arthur-Virden Steinbac:h Riel St. JamEIS Lakesidt� Charleswood lnte rlaket Brandon East Tuxedo Spring fiEIId Wolseley St. Boniface Minnedosa Crescentwood Gimli Point Do,uglas Ink ster The Pas St. Norb,9rt Elmwood Morris Bu rrows Sturgeon Creek Brandon West Assiniboia River East Pembine1 Portage Ia Prairie Eme rson Dauphin Lac du Blonnet Transcona Niakwa St. Vital Gladstone Turtle Mc)untain Broadws1y Kirkfield Park Flin Flon La Verendrye Fort Ganry St. John!� Swan Rrlfer Rossmere Rupe rtsl:and The Map,les PARTY .

Liberal NDP NDP Liber al NDP NDP PC PC PC NDP NDP PC PC PC Liber al PC PC NDP NDP PC PC NDP Liber al PC Liber al PC NDP Liberal NDP PC NDP PC NDP PC PC PC PC PC PC PC NDP PC NDP PC PC PC PC NDP PC NDP PC PC NDP NDP

5040 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MANITOBA Monday, July 5, 1993 The House met at 8 p.m. ORDE RS OF THE DAY (continued) COMMITTEE OF SUPPLY (Concurrent Sections) CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION Mr. Deputy Chair person (Marcel Laurendeau): Will the Committee of Supply please come to order. The Com mi ttee of Supply is resuming the consideration of the Esti mates of the Department of the Civil Ser vice Com miss ion. When the committee had last s at, it had been considering item 1. (

a) Executive Office on page 19 . Ms. Avis Gray (C resce ntwood) : I am just wonder ing if the mi niste r has the ma terial on appeals? Hon. Darren Praznlk (Minister responsible for the Civil Service Commiss ion): Yes, Mr. Deputy Chair, I would like to just correct the informat ion. I was advised earlier there were nine appeals. In fact, there were 12 appeals heard last year. Nine were de nied ; two were gr anted, and one was dismissed on ti me limits. So the information, to the best of my staff's ability today, I have avail able. Ms.

Gray: I am wondering if the minister could give us an upda te on the Ha y audit and the implemen tation committee and where that is at. Mr. Praznlk: My unde rsta nding from the commi tte e- and I am sure the member ca n ap precia te the ve ry un timely de ath of the committee's chair cre ated some difficulty no doubt when the Honourabl e Gerrie Hammo nd passed away last year, last fa ll. The work of the committ ee, however, cont in ued on, and I am advised that they hav e just about completed their work and within the next number of weeks will have a com pleted report for myself as minister. Ms.

Gray: That completed report, now just to clar ify, does tha t re port inc lude bas ically recommenda tions for implem entation of changes? Is that what the report is? Does the minister have a time frame that he himself would like to see such recomm endat ions imp lem en ted as part of his ministry? Mr.

Praznlk: As the member, I am sure, is aware, the purpose of the implemen tation committee was to do a num ber of things, one of which was to assess where these recommenda tions under the Hay audit report had already been implem ented, but also to make recommendations for how we can implement many of the findings of the Hay audit report. So I am looking forward to receiving that report. It would be premature for me to give a detailed analysis or a detailed answer to the mem ber's questions si mp ly because I have not read the re port and recom me ndat ions yet. I have not received them .

When I do th at, in terms of timet able, then I will be able to mak e a better assessment. Ms. Gray: Mr. Dep uty Ch airpe rson, I know the minister, when he first undert ook this project and set up the implemen tation committ ee, was quite concerned about the fact that some of his initial time frames for having things in place were not met for a variety of reasons.

So even thoug h the minister has not received the report and has not had a chance to analyze it yet, I am wondering if he has some sense however as to when he would like to see at least some of the recommendations in this report implemen ted since thi s entire project is quite overdue? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Depu ty Chair, just to let the member for Cresce ntwood know-1 know she has a great interest in this area, which we shar e-but a number of the administ rative changes, a number of the recommendations that flowed out of the- Hay audit committee have already been tackled by the Civil Service Commi ssion.

A number of them have been implemen ted, so it was areas that were somewhat more difficult or broader based that I am awaiting the recom men dations of this implemen tat ion committee. I shar e the memb er's concern. Needless to say, we want to ens ure that opportunities are provided and that we are advancing the cause of promoting

5041 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 and seeing more women in our public service and have opportunitie s for adva ncemen t within our public service. So I have not yet seen the report , the final recommendations. I know I have been briefed on occasion by mem bers of the committee. Many of the Hay audit recommendations have already been implemen ted by the Civil Service where they were able to do that, where there were admi nistrative changes that could be made. Some of the large r changes which require strategy for implem entation , I should have that report within the next number of week s.

I hes itate to pu t an exa ct time on it because it is not within my control, and there are a number of factors that could get in the way over which I have no control. But when I have that, I will want to look to some sort of speedy implemen tation of those recommenda tions where that is practi cal. Ms. Gray : The minister speaks to a number of recom men dations from the Hay audit that are already in place. I know that one of the issues tha t came up in the Hay audit was the issue of waive rs, and there were some suggestions within that report as to how to deal with wai vers.

I am wondering if, first of all, the minister could provide us with some background information, some statistics on the number of waivers that currently occur within the Civil Ser vice Co mm ission and some of the reasons. I will leave my question at that for now on waivers. Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Ch air, there was one problem that staff had flagged with me and I share with them in the use of the term "waive r" in the Hay audit report, because the term "waiver" obviously refers to waiving the competition to fill the posit ion, and the impl ication certai nly was there that it is used many, many times to the disadvantage of the promotion of women in the civil service, and I think that has some vali dity .

But ther e are many occasions when the waiver in fact is used in a very appr opr iate manner : re-em ploymen t, acting stat us, career development initiatives, succession planning, interchange arrangements, affirmative action initiat ives, et cet era. So there is good purpose for the waiver. I do not fault the Hay audit committee. I think that was something that women in the civil service had flagged when the audit was being done, the waive r as a prob lem, because that term comes up man y times when people see opportunities that have been given to spec ific individuals. It is not an elimina tion of the waiver.

If I recall comectly, ther e was some suggestion of that, not the •entire doing away with the waiver syste m, but certainly a very restrictive use of waivers. One has to balance a host of objectives, but I think the point is made, and I look forward to their recommen dations and working with the commission generally in how we deal with waive rs.

I c:an tell the honourable member that I think the waiver system ge ner ally, from my lim ited expE•rience with it, there is certainly a recognition that it should not be overused, and that it is not necE•ssarily a tool that should become common place by any stretch of the ima gination. We are ver y cognizant of tha t conce rn abou t use of waivers. Ms. Gray : I am not sure whether the minister was stating that there should be different termino logy used other than the term waiver or he is concerned about the perception of the definition.

Be that as it may, does the minister have some statistics in terms of the number of times waivers have been used and the reasons as well? I certainly concur with the minister that there are very appropriate occasions when there is a waiving of a competit ion, and I have no difficulty with that at all. * (201 0) Mr. l;:»raznlk: First of all, we do not have that data for '9 2-93 , because we are in the process of revising our data collection system and our ability to monitor in response to the Hay audit.

We are in the proc•:.ss of doing that, and I do not have that data for the member, or the commission does not have that data for the member today. But wit h respect to 19 91 -92, which would be a similar situati on, there were approximately 275 direct appointment waivers, approximately one-half of thl>se resulted from redeployment and workforce ad jus tment mea sures .

Of the othe r dir ect app c>in tm en ts, and I do not ha ve a sp ec ific breal�down, but they were used for such things as term convers ions , reor ganizations, technical appctintments, term app ointments, reassig nmen t following LTD or workers compensation cla im, acting status, career develop ment initiatives, succession planning, affi rmative action initiatives and !interchange arrangements. So I do not have the breakdown specif ically, but I do not think we had many appeals resu lting from or complaints

July 5, 1 993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5042 resulting from that use at all. There might be one or two from time to time, that happens, but I think generally speaking the vast majority of those have been used for the purposes that I have outlined. Mr. Depu ty Chairperson, I would just like to table for the benefit of the member, so she appreciates the change in data collection, the new form that came out of the Hay audit which obviously provides a much greater bit of information as to the purpose of direct appointments, so I table that for the benefit of the member. Ms.

Gray : Does the minister have any breakdown of the 275 direct appointments, or actually the one-half of those, the ones that were ma de not as a result of redeployment? Does he have a break down of that one-half of the 275 in terms of number of positions that were at a, wha t I would cal l, director level or abo ve? Does he have any breakdown in terms of classificati on? Mr. Praznlk: No, I do not, because as I have pointed out earlier, our data collection syste m did not allo w for that detailed a breakdown . That is why we, in fact, have changed the data collection sys tem.

So we should start to ha ve that information in greater detail for next year. Ms. Gray : In regard to the waiver sys tem, just if the minister could briefly explain : What is the process, or more importantly who makes the final decision as to whether a waiver of a competition will be allowed? Mr. Praznlk: Firstly, in the case of all depart ments, the Civil Service Commission's authority for hir in g is de le gated to those dep ar tm en ts, so consequently it is the department who makes the decision.

They are required to documen t the reasons for the dir ect appointment, or waiver of competition, and that documenta tion is subject to both an appeal and the audit of the Civil Service Commission. Ms. Gray: I notice in the appointment summ ary for direc t appointments that one of the types of direct appointm en ts is tem porary ac ting status and tem porary casual . I can apprecia te the minister does not have any sta tistics, but can the minister's staff give any idea of those direct appointments, the percentage of direct appointments that might be in those two cat egories?

I ask that because I would as sume that may be wher e a lot of the direct appointments occur. Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chair, in answer to the memb er's question, as the member may be aware, I believe that we require that type of appoi ntment after you have put someone in to temporarily fill a position for 11 days.

I think the memb er's assessment is probably fairly accurate from the feelings of the staff of the commission in that many of them would be filling vacancies, many of which would be because of materni ty leaves, for exam ple, where people have been brought up tem porar ily to fill a position because of a ma ternity leave, or where someone has vacated a position. Anywhere where you mus t fill in for more than 11 days, one requires that direct appointment to be made. Ms.

Gray: Can the minister tell us, even though he has not seen a final report of an implem entation plan as a result of the Hay audit, has the Civil Service Commission, because of that issue raised in the Hay audit, have they dealt with their policy on waivers at all or made any changes in the int erim? Mr. Praznlk: Yes, Mr.

Deputy Chair, I think in keeping with the Hay audit report or some of the comment ary of the Hay audit report, the Civil Service Commis sion staff has been working with a departmental committee to, I think, give people in the departments where the authority has been de legated a greater sense of definition of the reasons why one would use the criteria by which you would use direct appointment.

I think one of the problems we have experienced in the past, or I get a sense that it has been a problem in the past, is that lack of real knowledge and understanding of the reasons why you would use a dir ect appointment and what is appropria te and what is not. So this committ ee, of which the Civil Service Commis sion is a part, has certainly been working with the dep artments to, I think, give greater definition to the purpose, and that is one of the reasons why this parti cular forum has been developed and the lines between the categories are clear, et cetera, for tracking.

If I recall the Hay audit report correctly, one of the great concerns is if you are going to use this vehicle, let it be used according to the rules and be used correctly. You cannot really track that if you do not have the data , and you cannot get the data if you do not have the right reporting procedure, and it does not work if people are not aware of the rules

5043 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEMB LY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 and the proced ures. So all of those are slowly coming into place. Ms. Gray: I want to bring up the one situa tion; this is a deputy minister position that Loretta Clarke has filled. I bring that up as an example act ually, and I know my colleagues in the NDP caucus have raised it a numb er of times, and I use it as an ex ample because pe rhaps the mi nister could explain to us, was there a waiver of a competition in that situation? Mr. Praz nlk: Mr.

Depu ty Chair, first of all, I should point out that the individual that has been raised by the member for Cresce ntwood has been appointed tem porarily until March of 19 94, at which time a competition will be held. The position has been vacant since July of 19 92 .

The individual was considered qualified to be appointed on a tem porary basis until a competition is held : a long-term resident of the North; recently general ma nager of the Comm unities Economic Development Board; president of the chamber of comm er ce ; chair, Norman Region al Hospital Board; past owner-businesswoman of a pharma cy in Lynn Lake ; public relations work with Calm Air; a Bachelor of Science, I believe, and a certificate in educatio n. [interjection) Mr. Praznlk: Well, memb ers speak about past political affi liations.

For some of us who come from Se lkirk, we re memb er Terry Sar geant; we re memb er Phil Eyler; we remember Bill Shead, who is a federal Liberal candidate, who is now with the Department of Veterans Affairs. I am sure one can look for these kind of parallels in virtually every province of Canada and every government, people who have run for all political parties, in fact , but I think the mem ber would agree that the individual is very well qualified for the job. I am advised that there has not been an appeal in any way filed to date. *

(2020) Ms. Gray: In response to the minister, I do not really care how qualified the individual is, because the question that I am asking, and I do not care how many people have been appoi nted by Liberals, NDP or Conservatives in the past . I thought that this government wa.,ted to see a change in terms of how things were handled and that we started to de pol iticiz e the civil service as opposed to continuing to politicize the civil service.

I W!Juld ask the minister if he could indicate to us, in that particular competition or position that was filled on a tem porary basis, what would the reason have been for a waiver in that ins tance of this situation we are referring to. Mr. F'raznlk: I am advised that the reason why it was flilled temporarily is that there was a backlog of work to be done; consequently, it was necessary to fill thet position tem porar ily, to deal with the backlog of work, with the commitment, of course, to go to a com petition . Ms.

Gray: Well, can the minister tell us-ce rtainly one o,f the issues about waivers of competitions is not only in positions which are hired or filled on a permanent basis, but cert ainly positions of a tempc>r ary or acting basis. Ofte ntimes individuals will Sely, whether they are outside the civil service or within, that they do not get an opportunity to even apply for competitions for a tem porary or acting status posit ion. Ther efore , someone el se appoi nted into position has an opportunity to learn the functions of a particular job.

Then, when the positkm does come up for filling on a permanent basis, they feel that these individuals who are appoi nted into the positions with no com petition actually have an advant age. So I would ask the minister: Why was there not a competition held, even for an acting stat us for this positic>n, even within the civil service which, as the minister knows, can take less time than a full- blown competition and cert ainly might deal with the backlc>g/ti me issue? Mr. Praznlk : Mr.

De puty Ch air, I say to the member that the departmen t had a backlog of work that it had to address and felt that it had a qualified individual, I might indicate, in the affi rmative action category who could do this work. I would point out to the memb er for Crescentwood, I know, in my own department, we have, over the last number of months, been rota ting people through management positi ons when Mr. Fa rrell was acti ng chief exec utive officer of the Workers Com pensation Board, and there were a number of people that we put inlto tem porary acting appointments.

A couple of women in our department, for exam ple, moved up to fill roles as we moved people up the ladder. I do not think she is suggesting that we should have posted all of those competitions as well, all those positicms to competitions. We used some of them to develop opportunities for management skills in

July 5, 1993 LEG ISLATIVE ASSEM BLY OF MAN ITOBA 5044 people in our de partm ent. So I guess it is a balanc e. Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, the minister's answer in regards to a backlog of work, I would imagine that every single em ploying authority could use that reason for every single position they might nee d to fill within the 26 depa rtm ents of government. So I find that reason quite flimsy.

I guess my question, and I ask this question so that any em ploying authorities in government can hear it and know what they can use it when they want to put someone into a position that they choose to without a competit ion. Is this reason quite readily accepted by the Civil Service Commis sion and the minister as a reason for wai ver? Mr. Praznlk: Obvi ously, there has to be in fact a backlog of work. I just point out to the member for Cresce ntwood that the same criteria or similar criteria is presently being used by her federal lea der to appoin t ca ndida tes in ce rtai n constitu encies.

I seem to recall reading in The Globe and Mail just yes terday that a cand idate appo in ted in a

part icular ridi ng was done so because he was so busy he did not have time to cam paign for it. The point of the matter is, of course, the department truly has to have a backlog of work and has to ju stify tha t pa rt icular appointment. Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Ch airperson, I would ask the minister in his heart of hear ts does he really support these types of appoin tments, where in fact there is not even the opportunity for people within the departments to apply for even these positions on a tem porary or acti ng status basis? Mr.

Praznlk: Yes, first of all, I say to the member within a variety of departments, including mine, where we have had opportunities to move people through and give them opportunities to do mana gemen t positions on a tem porary acting basis, we have ma de direct appointme nts to those. In some cases, they have been to give female members of our staff management opportunities that they otherwise may not have. So, quite frankly, there is a purpose for them. They should always be used sparingly, and there must in fact be some logical reason for it. I think the Minister of Northern Affairs (Mr.

Downey) has answered ques tions in this area with respect to the individual being certainly well qualified, certainly in the affi rm ative action category, and certainly the need for the work to be done which did not allow for permanent com peti tion. So, aga in, it is a balance. There are circumstances where it potentially could be abused. There are circumstances where it is very justif ied. It depends on the individual case . I will support it or not support it on a case-by-case view, but ultimately the Civil Service Commi ssion has the ability to review those decisions. Ms.

Gray: I agree with the minister that these positions should be looked at case by case . As I already mentioned, I concur with the fact that there are circumstances where there is good reason for a wai ver of competition. The mi nister uses the example of redeployment as one of those.

I would ask the minister: Is he not concerned and is it no wonder that the Women in Government organization and a number of individuals were concerned when the Hay audit came out when one of these issues of waivers was raised, when we have here in committee tonight the minister using backlog of work as a reason to have a waiver for a competit ion? I mean, real ly, no wonder ther e is ext reme concern about the Civil Service Com mission and what goes on in terms of people being hired to posit ions.

I had really thought and had hoped that this minister, and I heard him speak at a Women in Government meeting a couple of years ago when he first became minister, would bring a different flavour to the mi nistry , to the Civil Se rvi ce Commission, and that we would really see some changes in terms of how things are done. I see this as direct political interfere nce. It is nothing different than what has gone on for the last 1 0 years, but I had hoped we might see some changes, particularly with this minister. *

(2030) Mr. Praznlk : Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I think that if you look at the circumstances of this

part icular case, if you look at the individual involved and her qua lificat ions, who is certa inl y a female, an af firmative act ion category, very, very capable. I just say to the memb er that I think perhaps the member has difficulty with this situation in which it is used because of the politics of the individual, but in other circumstances where the politics of an individual may not be known, I have not yet hear d the member raise it as an issue.

5045 LEGISLATIVE ASSEM BLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 I think one has to appreciate the circumstances. I appreciate her concern that one should use these waivers sparingly, be cautious of the rea son, but ther e are many cases where, under similar circumstances, waivers have been used to provide to women and other affirmative action candidates an opportunity for man agement experience, which was certainly one of the thrusts of the Hay audit report. Mr. Steve Ashton (Thompso n): Mr.

Deputy Chairperson, I just want to finish off this part of the discussio n, because I know there are quite a few people I have talked to who are quite curious about the particular appointment in question. I just want to ask the minister: Was this approved by the Civil Ser vice Com missioner in the Civil Se rvice Commission? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Depu ty Chairperson, first of all, the Civil Service Com mission does have to give an approval. Their crit eria is that, one, a competition does have to be held at some point, that if you are filling on

an act ing basis ther e has to be a commitment to hold a competition at some future date, appr opriate date, and, secondly, that the individual filling the position is qualified. I am sure that the member would not want the comm is sion to disqua lify candidates simply because of their political aff iliatio n. If they are qua lified for the position and a competi tion is going to be held at a date that is acceptable to the Civil Serv ice Commission, they give their approva l. So in this particular case, I am advised that the approval was given. Mr. Ashton: Mr.

Deputy Chairperson, I was rather amused by the minister's suggestion that surely we would not want to disqualify the particular individual from further considerat ion. The individual was just appointed to the job, a $75,000-a-year job, a senior job within the dep artm en t, assistant depu ty minis ter's job. Am I to take it then from the minister's answer that approval was not given from the Civil Service Commis sion? Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Ch airpe rson , as I indicated to the member for Thompson, approval was given by the Civil Service Commi ssion for this to be a temporary ar;:>ointment with a compet ition to take place as committed in March 19 94. Mr. Ashton: Can the minister indicate exactly when the competition will take place ? Mr. F'raznlk: It must take place by March 19 94. Mr.

J�shton: I am just curious as to why-the min h�ter talked about work piling up in the depa11m ent-no action was taken, in going back to July, to en sure there was a competition made ava ilable, why the government waited a year and the n--a nd I love this word, Mr. Depu ty Chairperson -said it was impract icable to have a competit ion. I mean, one year afte r the posit ion has been em pty for that period of ti me, it was impract icable. Why? Mr. Praz nlk: Mr. De put y Chairper s on, as I indica ted, the ap plication was ma de, the Com mission approved it.

If one wants to question why there was a backlog of work in the department or what admi nistrative circumstances led to the positi on being vacant for a per iod of time and a backl•og growing, then I think that ques tion is best put tc. the minister in his Esti mates, and I believe the memb ers have had an opportunity to do that. Mr. ��shton: The member for The Pas (Mr. Lathlin) did attempt to get some answers out of the minister, and as usual the minister was rat her on the evasive side.

I just say that to anyone that looks at this, it is very, very clear that the minister made a political appointment, and the intent was very c:lear. If the intent had been to advertise the positic)n and get someone to deal with that backlog of WC)rk that the mi nister referred to, the government had a year. I mu st say tha t, when one issues Or de rs in-Council, talking about it being impr act icable to hold competitions, I would apprec iate some [interj•ection] Well, I am sorry if my pronunciation is wron�J.

Quite frankly, it is a word that does not appear in most people's dictionary when you have had a year to fill the appointment. I want to ask the minister in terms of his role: Did the minis ter ask the Minister of Northern Affairs (Mr. Downey), when the Minister of Northern Affairs presumably came forward with this name that just ha ppc�ned to come to the minis ter's mind, no accidEmt that the individual was the Tory candidate in Thompson in 199 0 or had previously worked for the mini ster as I be lieve a special assistant, execut ive assista nt, worked in the minister's office?

Did the minister in any way, shape or form ask if there might be other qualified people within the department or many people within the North? I know of many people, and given the fact that you are dealing with many aboriginal communities,

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MAN ITOBA 5046 many aboriginal people that certainly would be eminen tly qual ified for a senior ma nag emen t position within government. Did the minister raise that ques tion with the Minister of Northern Affai rs. Mr. Praznlk: Yes, Mr. Deputy Chair, just to point out by way of process to the member for Thompson (Mr. Ashton), when appl ications are made for a wai ver or direct appointment, or they go through the process, the Minister responsible for The Civil Service Act, which I am, is not part of that loop.

My app roval is not required in any way, and so the matter does not come to my desk, quite frankly. It is dealt with in the commis sion which has a degree of independence from the minister, which we have discussed on other occas ion. So, if the member is asking me specifi cally, was I part of that loop of approval? No, I was not. The commission inde pende ntly revi ews those appl icat ions, assesses whether or not the individual is qual ified for the job in question, which the individual, I am sure the member would agr ee, is qualified for the positi on, based on the information that has been provided.

The commitment was ma de to hold a com petition within a reasonable time period, given the posit ion, and the Civil Service gave their app roval just as they would deal with any other application from the department involving any other individual who had not run for any political party. Mr. Ashton: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I think there would be no doubt if a fair and open competition had been held during that one-year period, but that has not happened. We now have someone in an acting position.

I think the minister has to recognize that some of us are a little bit su spicious of the correlation between the individual who received the "acting ap pointme nt" and talk about being qualif ied. Perhaps that individual might have the qualification of that little blue card that other northerners might not have in the way of qualifications, quite a few northerners. I realize that the Tories are in a minority in northern Manitoba, but I was quite am azed when the minis ter before talked about affi rmative act ion. Affirm ative action in the North does not mean hiring Tor ies for government jobs.

In fact, I hope the minister, when he was talking about affi rmative action being a criterion in this, would indica te that there was really no attempt, because there was no open interview process to ens ure tha t any thing took

part in the decision-making process here, including affirm ative act ion. So I find it rather interesting. We shall see, Mr. Deputy Chairperson, where this matter rests. I would lik e to ask the mi niste r a follow-up ques tion in terms of if the minister can indicate if there are any other hirings in the Department of Northern Affairs that have not gone through the normal process, and if the minister has ensur ed himself that all jobs in the Department of Northern Affairs where hiring has taken place in the last couple of years have been conducted within normal civil service pract ice. Mr.

Praznlk: Firstly, the memb er talks about relu ctance and some skep tici sm on political names. Let me tell you I can sympathize with that posit ion, because I had the same skeptici sm when Mr. Terry Sargeant was hired by the provincial government following his defeat as my memb er of Parliament for Porta ge-In terlake in 1984, the same skepticism when we saw a host of other individuals brought into positions, the same skepticism with individuals that we find from time to time who are former political staff people for the Pawley admin istr ation who are in the civil service .

One could have the same skeptic ism , ask the same ques tions, and wonder if a little orange card had not help ed them out. But we will not get into that in gr eat detai l, because that is a natural skept icism, and I can certainly appreciate where the memb er is coming from. I know there are plenty of occasions in the past years,

part icularly between 1981 and 1988, and 1969 and 1977 when one could have had the same skepticism if I were sitting in his seat as an opposition memb er. So I certainly apprecia te where his question is coming fr om. *

(2040) With respect to the Department of Northern Affairs, my staff advise me that they are not aware of any other waive r applications coming forward from that department, and I do not believe-! look to them for advice- that there were any appeals of any competit ions held in that department that were success ful. Mr. Ashton: But there were not waivers, and we shall see. I do indicate to the minister again that, when we have appointments that are obviously being made in what is not a normal process to anybody-any outs ide observer would not suggest

5047 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 that the one-year delay and th is supp osed tem porary appointment was anything other than a direct political appointment. Be that as it may, let the Minis ter of Northern Affairs (Mr. Downey) and the minister of the Civil Service Comm ission (Mr. Praznik) recognize it, Mr. Depu ty Chairperson, a political appointment in this case being a political appointment ins tead of trying to work around the civil service syst em.

As I have said to the minister, I would hope that the many other northerner s who are at least as qualified, without getting into relative qual ifications for the position, will have the opportunity to apply for the job. I want to ask the mi nister a follow-up. I mentioned in terms of affirmative action, and I gave notice prior to five o'clock, what are the current figures in terms of target gr oups, in terms of affi rm ative action this year, and how do they compare to the previous year? (Mrs. Shir ley Render, Acting Depu ty Cha irperson , in the Chair) Mr.

Praznlk: Madam Acting De puty Ch air, in prov iding that information for the memb er for Thompson (Mr. Ashton) in terms of the identified affi rmative action categori es, in respect to their growt h, if I may provide that by comparison of data, and I will compare to their num bers in the civil service in percentage in the civil service as of March 31, 1987, compared with March 19, 1993. In terms of fem ales-r ememb er I have to put the caveat on this information that it is all the result of self-declaration, that there may be other individuals who have chosen not to declare an affirmative action category .

I know the member is familiar with that, but I think it is worth noting the caveat. In terms of females, as of March 31, 1987, 45.6 percent of the public ser vice wer e fema les compared to 49.31 percent today. On the aboriginal side, in 1987, 3.81 percent of our civil servants had declared themsel ves to be in that abori gin al category. That is 5.28 percent today. In the disabled catego ry, March 31, 1987, 2.01 per cent of the public service had decl ared thems elves to be in the disabled category.

That is 2.6 9 percent today, and in terms of the visible minority category in 1987 it was 2. 26 percent, wherea s today it is 2.63 percent. Again, from 410 in this category to 472. I would point out to the memb er as well that, although we may not be exactly where we want to be in terms of targets, we have gone through a fairly signi ficant reduction in positions in the last number of years, and so the opportunities to bring new people in to the civil service have been considerably reduced, as I am sure the memb er appre,cia te s. Mr. Ashton: Madam Acting Depu ty Cha irperson, I asked in terms of '92-93.

I am quite aware of the historical data. I am wondering if the minister could provide information on the current situation in terms of both numbers and percentage as well as the current target figures for the various target groups. Mr. F'raznlk: Yes, Madam Acting Deputy Chair, with n�spect to 1992 just by those same catego ries, females represented 48.8 percent in March 21, 1992 compared to 49.31 pe rce nt in 1993 . Abori!�inal represented 5.04 percent in March of 1992; it is increased to 5.28 percent in March of 1993.

Disabled category represented 2.6 6 percent in March of '92, and that has increased just sligh tly to 2. Ei9 percent, an increase of actual ly three individuals. On the visible minority declaration, we have dropped just slightly from 2.7 percent to 2.63 percent. Mr. Ashton: What are the comparative numb ers for thciSe two years? Mr. Prazn lk: Yes, by category agai n, female, 8,927 compared to 8,856, again pointing out to the memb er that the si ze of the civil ser vice has decreased in the last year. On the aboriginal side, 922 in 1992 to 948 in this year; it has increased.

On thE� disabled side, 486 in 1992 to 483 in 1993, and vi1sible minority, 493 in 1992 to 472 in March of 1993. Mr. Ashton: And wha t are the current target figures? Mr. Praz nlk: Madam Acting Depu ty Chai rperson, the target, which is to be over a 15-, 20-year period if I recall correctly from my information from staff , in terms of females it is to be 50 percent. So we are just about there. On the aboriginal side, it is to be 10 percent, althou,gh the 5. 28 percent in terms of the labour force, the aboriginal communities say accounts for about 5 percent of the labour force.

So we are on target in terms of labour force avai labilit y but not accord ing to percentage of population. I think that is refl1�ctive of a very large numb er of younger

July 5, 1993 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5048 people in the aboriginal community who are not yet in the labour force age. Of the disabled community, our target is 7 percent, and in the visible minority, about 6 percent. Mr. Ashton: I thank the minister. I point out in terms of aboriginal people that the labour force would hardly be a fair measure . Aboriginal people have had much lower participation rates in the labour force-ad ults, those over the age of 1 6-- and it is la rgely as a result of the lack of job opportu nitie s. Many people just simply do not register in communities for job opportunities.

I am jus t wondering if the minis ter has any concerns about the fact that-and the minis ter is correct, this is a 15 -year program that was put in place by the previous government. Is the minister not concerned about the fact that, in terms of visible minority represen tation within the civil service, this is the second year in a row, as I reca ll, where there has been a direct reduction in the number of visible minority people, both as a per centage and as a total number of em ployees within the civil service? *

(2050) Mr. Praznlk: Yes, Madam Acting Depu ty Ch air per s on, I am sur e the member for Thompson -we have had this discussion both inside this committee room and privately before, and I think he appreciates some of the conflicting principles that come into play here. One of the reasons obviously for some of the decline in the last year was, under the terms of the collective agreement and the bumping provisions, obviously, that those who were hired, the senior ity provisions do not favour those people who are our newest hirings, particularly if they are in term positions, et cetera.

So the principle of seniority, which is part of our collective agreement, sometimes conflicts, when you are in a downsizing situati on, with retention of your latest hirings. It is a dilemma I am sure the member appreciates because they are both valid principles.

Another concern that I share with him as minister respon sible is the abil ity to provide not jus t opportunities in the civil service for our target ca tegories, but also the opportu nities for the dev elopmen t of role models in more senior positions, having people in senior positions who can appreci ate and recruit, et cetera, and assist in recruiti ng, be role models-and one gets again into the conflicting principles.

I know in discussions that I have had with the Manitoba Governmen t Employees' Union, their position has been pretty firm in dealing with affir mative acti on, that it should only be applicable, of course , to the entry level positions and not to affirma tive action within the promotions within the civil service.

But I would point out to the member, as well, that although we may have disagreemen ts on Bill 22 and some of the conflicting principles that come into pla y there, the fact that we were able to avoid a further 500 or so layoffs in the civil service this year ha s ce rt ainly bene fited our category gr oups because, as our more recent hirings, they are likely to have been -and I do not have a data because we did no t have to ident ify 500 positions to elim inate, but the odds are that they would have been more heavily affected by those 500 layoffs or so than other categories.

So, although we may disagree on some of those conflicting principles in Bill 22, one of the side benefit s to that legislation is certainly som e protection at least to our more recent hirings in the affi rmative action cate gories. Mr. Ashton: Madam Acting Deputy Chairperson, I am concerned here that for two years in a row, and I think that the minister confirms tha t-1 know he covered a number of other issues -but last year the same situation arose, there was small, if any, progress- relatively small progress -i n the case of a number of the other target groups which would be expected over time.

In this case there has actually been a drop in terms of the physically handicapped, dis abled. In terms of absolute numb ers, it is basically very similar, but there has been a drop in terms of visible minority once again.

I would like to ask the minister, and I note under Employment Services that one SY was elim ina ted in the area that deals with identifying barriers and issues related to affirmative action, de livering affirmative action programs and activities, and consults with depa rtments on af firma tive action plans, stra tegies, to achieve objectives and reviews progress, if it is not somewhat inconsistent to be removing the adminis trative support position in this par ticular case from an area wher e there is obviously some difficulty.

5049 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 While the minister can talk about the impact of layoffs, and we are all aware of the lay offs and the positions that have been elim inated, the impact that is having on the civil service, it would seem to me that, if one is serious about affir mative action and identifying for two years in a row that there has not only been no progress in terms of visible minorities but that there has actually been a decline, perhaps not only should there not be a cut, but there should be some renewed em phasis in trying to deal with that particular problem.

Does the minister not feel that there is some inconsis tency in taking that action within the department? Mr. Praznlk: Madam Acting Deputy Chair, first of all, the one position that the member refers to that has been elim inated, that one particular SY, was an Adminis trative Support position, as the member appreciates. We were able to handle that by the amalgama tion of a variety of offices that allowed us to elimina te that position and st ill provide the admin istrative support to our officers.

I know some of the work that has taken place by commissioned staff , and working with the various groups that we have organized, the consolidation of our affir mative action programs and career development has certainly been refocusing our efforts, and I think attempting to improve our abili ty to recruit. I say to the mem ber, I agree with him that there is certainly some difficulty here, and there are a host of conflicting principles that have come into play that have made it somewhat more difficult to deal with af firma tive action hiring.

I must admit, I can appreciate the argumen ts when we have met with the MGEU and their position, but it certainly is not one that allo ws us to develop at the more senior levels the kind of role models and individuals that provide the opportunities that see people in those categories move forward. I respect the principles. I respect where they are coming fr om, but there are a host of conflicts here that do make it somewhat more di ff icult.

Ultimately, the main prob lem, of course, is that we have not had the positions coming open in the last couple of years, because of budgetary restraint, that would have allowed us to provide those kinds of opportunities. That is regrettable from the affi rmative action point of view. So we have been in somewhat of a holding pattern, as the me mber can ap pr ecia te. We ju st have not had the opportunities. Re�;1rettably, I cannot do anything about that. We do not have those positi ons, and I cannot create them. So we try to do the best with what we have availa ble. Mr.

A!shton: Unless, of course, it is imprac ticable to hold civil service competitions. One has to have direct appointment. (Mr. Deputy Chairperson in the Chair) Mr. Praznlk: Affirmative action. Mr. Ashton: Well, the minister says affirmative action. Perhaps the minis ter might want to look in northmn Manitoba where there are many other peoplE! that would be involved with any of the Tory groupl3 in terms of affirma tive action, that had no opportunity or have had no opportunity up to this point in time to apply for the particular position.

I want to deal with a couple of other questions in terms of the process in terms of civil service hiring, and I gave notice of this earlier, Mr. De puty Chairperson. I wcould like to ask the minister what the current num biH-a nd I asked this question last year. I th ink , perhaps, in the shu ffle it was not a communi cated follow-up in terms of number of em ployees, but I am wondering if there has been any analysis of the number of em ployees afte r the most recent round of layoffs in the Departments of Health, Family Services as of last week.

What I am looking for is the numb er of civil servants outside of the city of Winnipeg and inside the ci�f of Winnipeg over the last number of years, and parti cu larly comparing, prior to the much ballyhooed decentraliz ation announcement of the government before the el ection and the reality of the number of job losses that have taken place since that time. I am looking, again, for number s of positions, because that is the key thing that matters to the communities involved. Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Depu ty Chair, first of all, I say to the meomber, if I recall the discussion last year, and the staff and I were discussing why the member did not get the information that he bel ieved he was to get, I think if we go back to last year there was some difficulty with the request because we did not keep information in the kind of manner tha t the mem ber requested it. All 1that I could provide the memb er, quit e frankly·-and this is not really fair to the question tha t he asked-is really a snap shot of the

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5050 geographic location of our em ployees throughout the province, not the positions av ailable. So, if there were vacancies, I under stand that would not show up in this list. So it is not a listing of pro vincial government positions outside of Winnipeg and inside of Winnip eg. It is a list of where our em ployees would be at any given time. So the form in which the data, in fact, that the member requested last year was, quite frankly, not available in that form.

That is why I believe we even discus sed that at committe e last year, if my memory serves me correct, and it may be wrong. But, again, I do not have that kind of exact numb ers for the member. Ali i have is the snapshot which would not necessarily be accurate for kind of purposes that I think he intends. Mr. Ashto n: I do not care , Mr. Depu ty Chair person, if the mi nister ha s Polar oids or Kodaks or whate ver. I am ju st asking for the information. I would point out that information has to be available somewher e . I mean, the governmen t ha d a policy of decent raliz at ion.

Surely it knows, and has known the last number of years, where its jobs are, where its people are employed. I asked this question la st year. My under standing was I would receive some information, given any difficulties within the syste m.

If the minister does not have that available now, I will stress again that I would appreciate, at a follow-up tim e, to receive a lis t of the jobs and whatever explana tory notes, in terms of the meth odology used, both in rural, northern Mani toba and within the city, the numbers of jobs and going back to 19 89, to look at what has happened before and afte r decentralization.

Because I know in my own community many people are concerned that, despi te the talk of dece ntral iza ti on, there are actually fewer jobs now in the civil service than there were before, and I think people need to know the bottom line. * (210 0) I ha ve a fur th er ques ti on, Mr. Depu ty Chairperson, just to ask the minister as well, or a concern to raise, and that is in terms of training and retr aining.

I have been contacted by a number of people affected by the announced layoffs, particularly recently by those in the Children's Dental Program , who expressed some concern about the difficulty in receiving commitmen ts to follow through on proper retrai ning. I would li ke to ask the mini ster to perhaps give an update in term s of that to the comm ittee and raise the conce rn tha t was expressed to me about the fact that there are a numb er of people now who feel tha t the commitmen ts that were put in place have not been followed.

So if I could get the information on decentralization, rural and Winnipeg, either at this point in time or at some later date, and an update on training and retra ining. Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Depu ty Chair, to the first part of the memb er 's question, with respect to the data that he asked for: positions in a community, quite frankly we do not have that. That is available on a de par tm ent-by-depar tment basis in their breakdown in the Esti ma tes. All that we can provide him is on a given day the number of people who are actually em ployed, not the positions ava ilable, and there is a difference.

If there are positions being filled, it may be very close, likely is very close, but we will endeavour to give him some of those snapsho ts in time and with the appropriate caveats. The second question with respect to retr aining. As the mem ber can appreciate, we have been fairly su ccessful throughout the reor ganiz ation of government in being able to find other opportunities for people whose positions had been elimi nated in the budget process, but there has been one area that has been most difficult, and the member has hit upon it: those who were em ployed in the dental progr am .

I admit that fully, simply because their skills are so unique they are not easily transferable to other aspects of government if they want to continue in that dental area. If they want to have a complete career change, it is much easier.

I am pleased to indicate, I believe last week an announcement was ma de that an unp recedented ag reement between the federal government and the Mani toba governmen t has been ma de to purchase , at a negotiated price, a block of eight seats from the Wascana In stitute this year and approximately another eight se ats next year to allow unemployed dental nurses to become dental hygienis ts, a career very much in demand in the rural areas. The price per seat is approximately $1 7,000. The federal government pays $1 0, 000 per seat

5051 LEG ISLATIVE ASSEMB LY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 plus the UIC benefits. The province covers the remaining --$7,375 to be exac t- per stu dent. The total provincial commitment for '93-94 is $59,000, approximately the same for the next fiscal year. A retraining package has also been offered to the dental assistants. Red River Commu nity College will develop a refresher program of appro xima tely 50 hours to be delivered this fa ll. The program will enhance the dental assistants' abilities in the area of adult dental treatm ent and computerization, allowing them to make the transition to private dental work.

The esti ma ted cost to the Province of Manitoba for development and delivery is about $1 5,000. A third choice is also available to either dental nur ses or assis tant s , that is specifically an orthomodule offered by the Ma nitoba Dent al Association to prepare for work in an orthodontic practice . The cost is appro xima tely $500 per student for 40 hours. Finally, for those dental em ployees who wish to pursue re-e mp loymen t with in the governmen t, considera tion will be given to individual retr aining on a case- by-case basis, exam ple, compute r tra ining. So we have a mult ifaceted training program.

I am very hopeful that we are going to be able to, by and large, have the same success with the 49 or so individuals who are affected by this program elimina tion-reduction as we had with other areas. I believe in the case of the Queen's Printer, for example , where ther e wer e 49 individua ls, a number who chose to retire were of that particular age, but of the majority who were affe cted, all but two, as of a few weeks ago, had been placed in other positions throughout the civil service.

So we have staff in departments and staff in the commission who have worked very, very hard to ensure that we have found other opportunities for most of the people affected by those budget decisions. It has not been our intention to put individuals out on the street, and by and large we have been successful at that. Hon. Linda Mcintosh (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affa irs): Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I just have one quick ql.lesti on. It was a follow-up to a comment that was made earlier. I am interested to know if the minister has any concept of how many people might not declare.

I am personally aware of three females and one hand icapped person who absolutely refuse to declare that they are female or handicapped. They just want to be treated like anybody else. Do you have any idea on how many might not fill out that

section or choose to report? Mr. Praznlk: Yes, in answer to the mem ber's question, we have no way at all of knowing the numbE�r of people who have not declared. That obviously prese nts a pro blem in determ ining the reliabil ity of your numbers. We have r,eally no way other than our own anecdotes to assesl� that proble m. Mrs.

Mcinto sh: A further clar ifica ti on, if the person specifically asks for that kind of privacy and wants to be treated as equal rather than special status or affirmative action, the employer and the imme diate super visor would not break faith with that privacy and report that that person was in a particular category? Mr. P1·aznlk: Mr. Deputy Chair person, the only exception to that rule, I am advised, is the ma le/ fe mah � breakdown, because that we get from standard information. But in terms of the other cate gories, we ha ve no way of knowing.

Of course, the informa tion is collected centrally, so in the ca�;e of visible min orities, et cetera , ther e would be no way of accum ulating that data unless one did a complete check of every manager, and they do not evEm know whether a person is decl ared or not. Ms. Gray : Mr. Deputy Chai rperson , I have a numb M of ques tions in the areas of the Civil Service Comm ission and appeals, staff training and detvelopment, the Affirm ative Action Program and also French Language Services.

Going back to the appeals, and I thank the minist�n for handing out the information on the appeals, I am wondering if the minister could help clarify lfor myself. One of the appeals, the appeal, Win-1 do not know how to pronounce the last name --Torchia, T-o-r-e-h-i -a-can the mini ster explain what exa ctly technical officers are? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chair person, I believe the member's ques tion is: What is

Section 32 of the act? Sectiion 32 of the act indicates, and I just read it to the mem ber, as we both work th rough this: Unless they are appointed by act of the Legislature, the Lieutenan t-Governor -in-Council shall appoint (

a) dep uty min isters, the clerk of the Executive

July 5, 19 93 LEGI SLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MAN ITOBA 5052 Council, the Clerk of the Legislative Assem bly, and other technical officers; and (

b) the memb ers, or members of the board of management or boards of dir ectors, of agencies of the governmen t with respect to any provision of this act that is brought into force. • (2 110 ) I believe the issue was the definition of technical officer by regulation? [inter jection] That is right, and the recommend ation of the board was for us to have the more appropria te regu lation in place to finding those technical officers. I believe I have tha t re commen dation , and we are working it through the process to correct that deficiency. Mr.

Deputy Chairpers on: Is there something some honourable mem bers would like to put on the record ? We are having tr ouble hearing it at this end. If we could just tone it down a little bit. Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, the minister then is indicating that as a result of this appeal, with the recom me ndation that the regula tions be changed, the department is currently working on that now. Is that correct? Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Chair, traditio nally, technica l appointm ent s have been wha t the member, to sum it up simply, would be what people refer to as political appointments, political positions, special assistants, executive assistants, Executive Council staff, and other appointme nts that would not have civil service sta tus. One of the things that this appeal discovered was, oh, for a long time, a deficiency in this regu lation tha t has, in terms of the specific definition, been around for a number of adminis trations, and they have made recommendations on how this should be corrected.

I am waiting for that to work its way through the legal process, et cetera, to give me a recomme ndation that I would then consider taking forward to cabinet. As I am sure the member can appreciate, it is to define those positions that do not carry with it the protec tion of civil service statu s. Ms. Gr ay : Mr. Deputy Ch airper son , can the minister tell us: Does he have a sense of which type of positions he would like to see as part of the technical officer, to be considered as part of the technical officers, if that is the correct way to define that?

I can appreciate that there has been past practice over the last number of years, but what other positions might then be inclusive of technical officers? Mr. Praz nlk: Mr. Deputy Chair person, if the member could repeat her questi on. Ms. Gr ay : If I ha ve this correc t, I am ju st wondering what type of positions is the commission or the minister or the department looking at to be inclusi ve as under a technical officer or under a technical position. Mr.

Praznlk: They would be positions that do not carry with it civil service status as the acts ind icated ; they incl ude deputy mi nis ters, can include assistant deputy ministers from time to time who would be part of the management, would not be part of the bargaining unit or within the civil ser vice.

It gives the abil ity to mak e a dir ect appointment to a per son who basically is at the pleasure of Lieute nant-Governor -in-Council without any of the protections of the act, very senior positions that the Lieutenan t-Governor-i n-Council would so choose, as I am sure the the member can appreciate, and as well as the positions that are traditionally viewed as political positions like staff of Executive Council and ministers' assistants. Ms.

Gray: To clarify, is the minister saying that with this change in regulation they would be looking at all positions that are considered management, i.e., that do not ha ve stat u s un der a un ion agreement? I would hope that is not the case. Mr. Pr azn lk: Yes, Mr. Dep uty Ch airperson, although there is some difficulty in defining this, specifically because it gives cabinet the abilit y to make an appointment under this section, it can include assis tant de puty mi nis ter, senior management, not career civil servants in those positions. This is outside of that vehicle.

It gives government the ability to make an appointment as a government decision to fill a senior management position, in addition to the regular political staff-type positions. I think, if the member recalls the Hay audit; as I know the memb er is very familiar with it in some of the discussions we had, this is the type of vehicle traditionally used for government to fill a parti cular position that they wanted to fill; senior management lives and dies with that government in essence, not protected through The Civil Service Act, not a career civil servant.

It flags that individual as someone who is the direct appointment of the government in that specific position.

5053 LEG ISLATIVE ASSEMB LY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 I know that, when we had discussions with the Hay audit implemen tation committee and with Manit oba Women in Governmen t, I think the suggestion was made to flag those appointments as people who come in specifically because the government of the day wants them in that senior position to do the job in that senior position. Of course , as for their appointment, they are not career civil servants. They have been slipped into the civil servants, but they live and die with the government of the day. Ms.

Gray : Is the minister suggesting, though, that we want to move to a system where in fact we have positions such as di rector positions and assistant deputy ministers, be given the opportunity to be not filled through civil service competition, that we want to move that politicization of positions down from a deputy minister and political staff level? I mean, I have no difficulty with deputy ministers being appointed by ministers of the Crown, and I have no di ff ic ul ty with pol itical staff being appointed.

But I thought one of the concerns that was mentioned, I think by the Minister of Labour in discussions with Women in Government, as an example, is that you wanted to move toward the depolitic ization of the civil service. Unless I am missing something here, I see this change of regulations, even though it has been done in past prac tice, that it is really just accomm odating that politicization, so I would ask for a clarification on that. Mr. Praznlk: Yes, Mr. Deputy Chair, first of all, I do not think the issue was the politicization of the civil service.

I think, for those of us who have worked in the capacity of ministers or worked within the civil service, I think the member would agree that large "P" Politics in the civil service is-1 mean, it is there to some degree, but I do not think it is by far a large-bred practice in any adminis tration. I think my experience is, with the vast majority of public servants, they do their job. They may have their political beliefs and political activity outside of the office, but they do their job. I do not think our civil service in Manitoba is, by and large, a politicized civil service. I think that people do their job.

What this provision does, and it has been there in the act for many, many years, is it allows a government to make some senior management appointmen ts and flag those people as their appointmen ts. • (21 20) I know when we had discussions with Manitoba Women in Government, my recollection of part of that di!�cussion was: Do not bury people you want to brin g into governmen t in the civil ser vice process. There should be a mechanism where you clearl) l say we are bringing this per son in to manage a particular area or to do a particular job and they are identified as such.

They are being brought in by cabinet which wants a specific job done by that individual. They are not afforded the protec tion of The Civil Service Act. They are not necess:arily career civil servants, but they are there to do a job that the cabinet has chosen to want done. I think that is a prerogative, quite frankly, that you have to leave to any cabinet of any political party: the abil ity to ma ke some , fr om ti me to ti me, important management appointments that they feel comfortable with, to impleme nt the policies that they wish to implemen t.

It is the balance between not poliiticizing the civil service and still having the ability as government to bring from time to time into admi nistration the people you specifically want to do a jolb and, as Manitoba Women in Government seeme 'd to indic ate at the time, having a mechanism to specifically flag those individuals, do it up front was a good thing. This provision is in the act. It requires some further clarification by regulation, which we intend to do.

I say to the member, although one could say it is there and you could mak e every appointment under this section, the reality of it is that these types of app()intments are very, very rare indeed and probablly will continue to be no mat ter who is in power in Manitoba. I do believe you ha ve to ha ve this type of prov ision so that the cabinet of the day, the governmen t of the day has the abil ity up front to bring into service from time to time people it wishes to take o:>n senior and important adminis trative roles in the !�overnment.

Clearly, a new government coming into power has the abili ty to reverse the Order-in-Council and elimin ate that person very quickly. So it is one of those balance issues, and I think it is a fair provision. It has been used for decades sparingly. Ms. Gmy: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, well, given the minister's comments whether I agree or disagree with him, but given what he has just said and

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5054 explai ned th en, does he then concur that the example we used previously of Loretta Cl arke , is that an example that falls into that category that the minister has just referred to? Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Chairperson, first of all, with the individual in question, one difference, of course, between the two vehicles is there is a commi tmen t to, within nine months, hold a competition for that position, which is not the case when these types of appointments are made, but the individual involved is a very well- qualified individual who will, if she chooses to, compete for that position later on in the year.

I say this to the member, it is easy always to flag an individual who may have some known political support for a party or have been a candidate for a party, but I think if the member goes through the an nals of governme nts of all political stripes, we could all point to examples where individuals have been hired who have been qualified for positions and the accusation is made that it is a political appoint ment. In her own political party I can think of a number of individuals who over the years were given senior appointme nts afte r they either lost a seat or were unsu ccessful candidates.

I am sure if her party wins the nex t federal el ection those types of appointments and things will happen from time to time, and they may be very well- quali fied individuals who properly go through the sys tem, and they will be tagged as the member is tagging this individual in Thompson because they have stood for office in a political party. That is always going to be part of the process.

I am sure the criticism is going to be made, but in this particular case I would remind the memb er that the ind ividual in this depar tment is a ver y well-qualified individual and had the approval for this by the Civil Service because there will, in fact, be a competition for this position. Whether or not that individual competes is a different question. They may or they ma y not, but there will be a competition,

whereas this other vehicle is a somewha t different circumstance. Ms. Gray: Mr. Depu ty Chairperson, I still would ask the questio n whether the example of the assistant deputy minister in the Department of Northern Affairs, is the minister clear that is simply another waiver of competition because of backlog of work or is that to be a position that could be tagged, as the minister uses the term , to force someone that the government, rightly or wrongly, wants to bring in to do a particular job? I am just asking for clarification on which is it. Mr.

Praznlk: I would advise the honourable member that if the Department of Northern Affairs was to choose not to hold a competition for this appointment they would be forced under the act and by the comm ission to ma ke a technical appointment. They intend to go forward with a competition, and we will have to await the results of that competition .

But the regrettable thing here of course is no memb er of this committee has raised any other circum stance wher e a female or a visible minority has been temporarily appointed into an acting status position for a number of months, what have you, to give them experience or abili ty or opportunity to fill that position except this individual in Thompson. I guess when you stand for office for a political party you are always going to be open to that type of accusation just as memb ers of my party will mak e it about the member for Crescen twood's (Ms. Gray) party or the New Democratic Party when they were in power.

That is part of the political game. But ultimately the individual has stood the test set by the commission for this type of action of being qualified, and the department has made a commitment to hold, within what the commission deems a reasonable time, competition for the job. We will just have to await the results of that competition. Ms.

Gray: Well, the issue of whether the person is qualified is not an issue in the sense that obviously when people are hired into a position, whether it is by competition or whe ther it is a waiver of competition, one would ass ume, one would hope and we expect that person is quali fied and is competent. I certainly have no doubt in my mind that the individual, in this case the Assi stant Dep uty Minister of Northern Affairs, Loretta Clarke, is competent. That is not the issue. The issue here we are discussing is a waiver of a competition and the reasons for it. So competency of the individual is not the issue.

Now, the minister asked for another example. Unfortunate ly, I do not have examples available to me of all the other departments, but you can look at the appeals that were handed out this evening by the mini ste r. Again, we have an exam ple of

5055 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 the-was it director or ADM of Status of Women wher e there was an appeal in regard to the technical classification? Basically, my question would be to the minister on this particular case, and, again, with all due respect to the individual who is in the position and, yes, certainly she is a qualified individual, but, again, the ques tion remains in this

part icular situation, there was a competition, a bulletin, and then a decision was made later on to have a waiver of the competition. So I would ask the minister, in this particular case, as another example, what were the reasons for the waiver of competition? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Ch air per son, my understanding of that particular issue was that the competition was in fact cancelled. The department made a technical appointment pursuant to the act which they have the authority to do.

If I recall the minister's answer to sta teme nts in the House , after reviewing cand idates in the competiti on, the mi nister felt there was not a suitable candidate coming forward and decided to make a technical appointment which is her right to do under the act as long as the proper procedures are followed. That is what in fact happened. Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chair person, I know that in a number of competitions which are held and sometimes for a variety of reasons, including the competency of the candidates, an individual who is suitable for the position is not found.

Oftent imes, the usual course of action is that the competition or bulletin is repeated. Can the minister indicate why that was not done in this case? Mr. Praznlk: Because the min ister responsible chose to ma ke a technical appointment. That is why it was not bul letined again, because that decision was made. • (21 30) Ms.

Gray: Can the minister tell us-1 do not know if he has these statistics-how many times within the civil service that there have been competitions held, a suitable candidate was not found and then it was decided by a mini�ter or ultimately through the authority of a minister, even if it was an employing autho rit y underneath, that ther e was an appointment made directly through a waiver at that point? I do not imagine you have that. Mr. PrllZnlk: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, we do not have that specific data for the member.

It is not something that occurs often, but it does occur from time to time and has occurred under a variety of admin iEitrati ons. Ms. G1ray: Mr. Deputy Ch airperson, I will not belabour this point anymore, but again suffice it to say I think there are a number of examples, again, where people within the civil service, whether they are women, whether they are individuals of an affirm ative action group or otherwise, oftentimes feel they do not have opportunities to duly apply for positions and compete because of the number of waivers of competition.

I hope, as the minister has said, that he will be looking at that and ma king some recomme ndations and bringing forth some real changes in that area. I woUIId like to move to the area of staff training and development. I know that in the staff training and development there has been a shift over the last couple of years where the staff training and developm en t branch negotia tes with various departments and looks at a business plan or a plan for the �;taft training and development. Does this

section of the department have a fiscal plan or a financial plan as to wha t types of revenue's they may receive over this coming year from the various dep ar tme nts, and is that an incr eas1� or a decrease from last year? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, first of all, I under s. tand that about 50 per cent of our expenditure there is cost recovered currently from departments at the present time, and the staff are in the process of working on a longer term plan for our operations. It is in the process of development by our staff, and we do not have that to table today or provide to you for that reason. Ms.

Gray : Mr . Depu ty Chair per so n, can the minister tell us, is it anticipated that there will be an in cre a�;e in re venues recove red from other departments, i.e., that this branch will have more busine s:s from the other departmen ts in regard to staff training and development? Mr. Pnaznlk: Wel l, quite frankly, one of the difficulti•es we have is our budgets are very tight within d•epartments, as I am sure the member can appreciate, so our expectation is not for increased expe nditure in this area. We hope for a steady cont inua tion of wher e we are , cer t ainly, not a

July 5, 1993 LEGI SLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MAN ITOBA 5056 decrease of any significance, but likely no increa se of any significance. I would say to the member that one of the-1 make this observation as Minister of Labour more than Civil Service minister.

I know from our own department's experience, when one has to pay for the cost of the training program , and I have to add this to it, when you have put the authority to ma ke that expenditure with your managers, as we have in the Department of Labour in our test program with the Treasury Board, then you have a much greater focus on what training courses are being taken. I know from our own experience in Labour that I think we have been more effective in our em ployee training for those two reasons.

If it is simply, you know, the cost element and the decisions are being made at a higher Ievei-I am not sure if that entirely is the case-but certai nly where you have given ma nager s control of that budget in the ir departm ent, then they can sort out what training is really needed by their staff, with their staff, and it is made at a very local level. So I think you can be more effective. I hope eventually tha t happens thr oughout government. So we do not expect increases. We · expect to hold the line over the next few years. Ms.

Gray : With the staff training and the courses that are through the Civil Service branch, can the minis ter give us a sense that, with the civil servants who atte nd the various training program s, whether they be one day or four days or a week long, is there any sense as to, if those staff are there on government time or do they go on their own time? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, it varies. There are many who are there on government time during the course of their work, and there are others who from time to time take training on their own time, depending on the types of courses that they want.

I know in my own de par tment we have had requests from staff, particularly admi nistrative staff , to take certain courses they felt would be very useful to them, to which we agreed. In order to be able to take them, they said they would take them on their own time, and we would pay the particular cost of the course, and we worked out those particular arrangements. So it varies. Ms. Gray : Would the minister concede that by and large the vast ma jority of individuals taking the tr aining through the staff training development branch would be there on government time? Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Chair person , I would indicate that there are probably a large number who do. I do not know if it is the vast majority. I do know, as well, that there are, from time to time, people in the civil service who do additional career development on their own without any support at all from government, on their own time, and they do not show up in our stati stics. So I really canno t give you one way or another a firm answer to that question. It varies. Ms. Gray: Does the minister have any sta tistics on the number of requests for educational leaves that there have been in the civil service? Mr.

Praznlk: Staff advise me that it has been under a dozen a year for the last quite a few number of years. Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, are there any circumstances where there are leave of absences for educational leave with pay as, say, part of an affi rmative action program or individualized plan? Mr. Praznlk: Just to clarify the types of leaves that we are referring to, in terms of that, under a dozen or so would be for paid leave. Ms. Gray : I want to move to French Language Services. I do not know if that requires that we do some switching of staff here.

I am wondering, to begin with, if we could have an idea of the various projects , perhaps the number and the nature of the projects that have been funded through the Canada-Ma nitoba agreement on French language services? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Depu ty Chair person, as I just sort out the information for the memb er, these are the projects that have been approved for '93-94. I am advised that there are over 20 applications that have been made that are in the process of being assessed and approved at the current time. For last year, we would have had about 15 projects that were approved. Ms. Gray : Mr.

Dep uty Ch airper son , can the minister give us an indication, without necessarily going through all of the projects, are these projects limited to a certain number of departments or are they widespread? I am particularly interested in Education, Family Services and Health. * (21 40)

5057 LEGISL ATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 Mr. Praz nlk: Mr. De pu ty Chai rpe rs on, I will endeavour to provide the member with a copy of the information. We have one here-but we will get it to you-wh ich is a matter of public record and lis ts last year's projects.

I can tell the me mber, those that are coming forward and are being considered for this year involve bilinguali zation of computer programs in cer tain de par tm en ts that have to be done, bilingual ization of fire and farm safety materials, for example, in my own department and Workplace Safety and Heal th mate rials where we are some what shor t, promo tion of our French Language Services, the act of offer option that the Premier (Mr.

Filmon) announced where we are promoting the fact that we have these services avai lable, training sessions and materials for staff in the Department of Educat ion, for example, some language classes, skills program for the management of volunteers, aga in, for people in the Fre nch la nguage, some new in itiatives in translations and

interpretations, some heritage publica tions -a host of applications, as I have said, that have come through, a full variety of th em. I think there is a need currently, I recognize, in ensuring that a lot of our government material, for example, and I speak from my other hat as Labour minister in Workplace Safety and Health and fire, et cetera-are not available in the French language. We have a fair bit of work to do to bring that up to speed. Ms. Gray: Mr.

Dep uty Chai rperson , does the minister have the amount for the '93-94 projects, the current amount of dollars that the provincial government would be putting into these types of projects? I recognize they have to budget for it on a full-dollar basis even though they receive half back, but could he give us an indi cation of the dollar amount? Mr. Praz nlk: I am advised that it is likely t o be in a total somewhere aro und approximately a million dollars. Ms. Gray: Mr.

Deputy Chairpers on, I do not know if the minis ter can do this more quickly than I can, but one million dollar s-w hat percentage of that is out of the total provincial budget? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chair, since history was my favourite subject and not mathematics, I can tell the member it is $1 milli on out of $5.2 billion and I will leave the math up to her. Ms. Giray: Can the minister tell us, is that an increa�se or a decrease from the budget from last year? Mr. Pr.aznlk: Depending on the number of projects that are ultim ately approved, it is likely to be just a slight decrease from last year. Ms.

Giray : Does the minis ter have any more detail! � on the process of active offer, aga in,

part icula rly in-let us take the Dep artm ent of Health as an example. What kinds of projects are there tlhat would be there to ensure that the policy of active offer is in fact implemen ted? Mr. Praznlk: I am pleased to indicate that 20 designa ted institutions, obviously 20 that service Fran c•ophone comm unities in Mani toba, are curre nltly working on the implemen tation of their plans t•o ensu re that services are provided as best as pos:sible and practical to their communities and their clientele. Ms. Gray: Mr.

Depu ty Chairperson, when the mini ste•r indicates ins titut ions, is he referring to hospitals and personal care homes? Mr. Praznlk: Yes, hospita ls. I believe personal care hc•mes, as indicated in the Gauthier report. Ms. G1ray : Can the minister tell us, within the Department of Health or even using his department as an •9Xam ple , the Department of Labour, what specific objectives are being looked at or what specific� policies are put in place to ensure that active c1ffer is present? Let us use the Department of Labc•ur as an example. Mr.

PreiZnlk: We have identified in our department staff wlho have a capacity in both of our official langu a1�es and are able to pr ovide services. I know in the Fire Commi ssioner's office, for example, we have ma de sure we let it be known to those communities and departmen ts that would feel more at ease in dealing with our branch in French that we have that capacity. We are also looking at this year if we are able to have some influence on t he French Language Ser vices min is ter to move toward the bilingu al ization of a lot of our ma terial because that is an ar•ea we feel we are definitely weak in.

That is going te> take on a priority. We have a fair number of staff currently who are able to provide service in two languages where we have a need, but it is in the materials area that we are short. That is one of the rea:sons those applic ations are currently there for funding this year.

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5058 Ms. Gray: I suppose one of the obvious areas for French language services at least within the city of Winnipeg would be the St. Boniface area, not that people who are wishing service and who are Francophone do not reside in other areas of the city, whether it be St. Norbert or St. James. I would ask the mi nis ter, in the area of St. Boniface in parti cular, have there been any specific projects tha t have been under taken by the depa rtm en t or through the Canada-Ma nitoba Agreement that would extend French language services in the St. Boniface community? Mr.

Praznlk: Yes, obviously, probably the largest ins titution in that particular community is the St. Boniface Gener al Hospital, which is currently implemen ting its plan to ens ure that they have services available for that community. As well, each government department that is located in that community provides services to those residents as currently part of developing the plans that they are working through. Specifically, St. Boniface Hospital, because it is located there ; ge ner ally, the departme nts of government that service that community. Ms.

Gray: That is all the ques tions I have under the area of Fre nch Language Ser vices. Just suffice it say that certainly I think it is a very important service that the government provides. The fact that there have been a number of staff who have been ded ica ted to the ex tension and expansion of French language services throughout the pro vince, I think, is pr ogress and ver y importa nt.

I know we probably have a long way to go in that area, but I think it is very imp ortant that at least that staff have been dedicated to look at this, and so we look forward to more projects being approved in future years, and the government looking at more crea tive wa ys to en sure tha t those Fr ench lang uage ser vices are ava ilable to citizens of Manitoba. * (215 0) I had a question, moving back into speech and hearing clinicians.

This was a question that came up actually in the discussion of the Estimates for Education, but it was related to the speech and hearing clin icians who had received letters, I believe, from their personnel departmen t or human resources department in regard to the employment issue of whether, in fact, if once they were let go from their positions with the government, should they be rehired by a school division, they would be, and I am going by memory, eligible for severance pay, but were not eligible for enhanced severance pay. I think that is the issue.

I was not able to get quite a clear answer in the Department of Educati on, and I thought it was probably best to bring that question here to the Civil Service. So I am wondering if the minister could tell us wha t the reason is, why they would be eligib le for the severance pay, but not the en hanced severance pay , and why a school division employer, if it was their future employer, would be considered different than if they were hired in another emp loyment situation. Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Deputy Chairperson, under the collective agreement, our empl oyees are entitled to a severance package under that par ticular agreement. When their positions ended with the civil service, they were offered that severance package as defined by the collective agre ement. The enh ance d severance package was designed for those people who were leaving the ser vice of government or gover nmen t-funded agencies primarily.

Since they were going to work- these individuals were picked up by other school divisions, where we in fact were providing funding for those positions, then the enha nced severance package was not made available to them. So that is why that occurred. Ms. Gray : So governme nt-funded agen cies I suppose would be other agencies, as well, such as Ch ild and Family Services or a hospital or an institution. Would that be correct? Mr. Prazn lk: No, the loss or not pro viding en hanced severance was wher e we funded specifically a position for the clinician, which we did with school divisions.

If they happened to leave the service of government and three months later retire, then six months later or a month later pick up a job in another government-funded agency .and we had not specifically desig nated or targeted employment for them in that area, then they would have been entitled to the enha nced severance pack age. It is just that the Ministry of Education provided funding to school divisions for those cli nician positions, and if these clinicians took jobs in those positions, were offer ed and accepted them, because they were specifically funded by the

5059 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 1993 provincial governm ent, we did not provide the enhanced severance package to them . Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I thank the minister for that answer. A number of the clinicians had asked, and so I had wanted to get on the record what exactly the reason was. Going back to some of the comments and some of the questions by the memb er for Thompson (Mr. Ashton) on affi rma tive action, I am wondering in the area of affirmative action, I know that now in competitions, they talk about affi rmative action will be considered. I forget the terminology that is used.

I am wondering if the policy on af firma tive action has changed at all over the last couple of years or been tightened up or if there has been any changes in the policy of affirmative action. Is the plan still that there will be statistics kept on, if we can use the word "quotas," in the affirm ative action program , and I ask that only because it can be and has been a controversial issue somet imes. Mr. Praznlk: No, the policy has not changed, but the Ci vil Service Comm is sion has issued guidelines for affirmative action in the recruitment and sel ection pro cess .

This was to clari fy a number of issues and ensure that everyone was operating from the same song sheet, so to speak. I note the mem ber's comments regar ding how sometimes these can be difficult situations, and I know from one's own experience with constituents, et cetera, that affi rmative action is not something that necessarily has wide appeal from those who feel that they have been elimin ated from a competition because they are not in one of the categories. One has to apprecia te that concern, but the policy cert ainly has not changed.

The guidelines have been issued to dep artme nts to provide tha t common playi ng field for implem entation so that people know in fact what the rules are and they have been clarified. We want to ensure that all personnel ma nagers are dealing with the same information. Ms. Gray: For the minister, is there any discussion or plans to rethink or look at the Affirmative Action Program in terms of how we keep statistics and the fact that we do look at prcentages and at a quota sys tem, shall we say?

Are there any thoughts on that, or are there any other jur isdictions in Canada or in North America that have perhaps found a better way to address employment equity? Mr. Praznlk: First of all, the nomencla ture that we surround or put to this issue obviously has some difficulty with. We do not, in fact, have quotas as the mE•mber uses the term . I do not say that to be critic al. We have long-term targ ets, but there is a certain emotive effect, I think, when you use the word "quotas." We have recogni zed, as I indic ated to the memb er for Thompson (Mr.

Ashton ), that in a period when you are downsizing the public service, you do not ha ve the oppor tuni ties and ne w positions coming up for competition to bring in a large numb er of new people. So our emp hasis has changed som ewha t within the Ci vil Ser vice Comm ission to pr oviding more tra inin g an d em plo)rment opportunities for those people in the target groups who are alr eady in the civil service becau�;e that is an area where we have people to work with. I know the aboriginal committee that has been formed, a group that has been formed to provide a network throug hout the civil service.

It ha s published a directory for use of its mem bers across the civil service. I have met with them, and we are exploring ways of providing more opportunities in ma nag 1emen t, more opportunities to learn how different parts of the civil service work. We are hoping that when we have more vacancies come forward at some point, by that time we will have more people in our target areas in managerial positions as role models and to provide advice and experietnce.

As I iindicated, these are not easy times in terms of expanding affirma tive action because we do not have the new entry positions, we do not have the vacancies. We are trying to do what we can given the circumstances that we are currently in. Ms. Gray: Mr.

Depu ty Chairperson, picking up on that cc)mmen t of the mi nis te r, ar e there any programs in particular for individuals within the civil service, particularly at the entry level of the civil service, programs whereby those individuals may wish t,o move up in the system and rece ive promotions but where there are not promotional opportu nities due to their lack of skills or, in particular, educational backgr ound? Are there any specific programs where individuals have an opportunity to have a plan developed with their supervisor and they can actually move up in the syste m?

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA 5060 •

(2200) Mr. Praznlk: Specifically, our Career Development Program has provided us with a bank of unfunded staff years so that departme nts wishing to assist an affirmative action candidate in developing skills and other opportunities can work out arra ngements.

We have the staff her e if they can provide the funding, and we will provide the training as well to give people those opportunities where we can work out arran gemen ts to deve lop their sk ills and training and expertise to be able to compete for and win other positions in the civil sm vice that are more mobile to their careers and adva ncement in their careers. We have used that program. It seems to be relatively suc cess fu l in givin g people opportunities. But, like in all things, of course, it is dependent upon working with a lot of people to make that come about. Ms.

Gray : Madam Acting Detputy Chairperson, how many unfunded staff yec:trs would there be available for this program? Mr. Praznlk: We currently have eight unfunded staff years in the bank. Ms. Gray: And can the ministE•r tell us how many of those are currently being utili: ;:ed in any particular type of program ? Mr. Praz nlk: Yes, we have three that are currently being used, so we have five vacant staff years in the bank which we have available to work with. Ms. Gray: Could the minister give us a bit of detail on those three positions and the nature of the projects? Mr.

Praznlk: Yes, the information that is available to me at this particular time indicates that one of those positions is working as a program policy analy st tr ainee in the Wome n' s Dir ec tora te. Another is an individual who is from the visible minority category who is working in the Citizenship

section of the department of multiculturalism and citiz enship, in an antiracism co-ordina tor type position, working in that particular field. Ms. Gray: Is this type of program well advertised within the civil service so that staff and supe rvisors are aware of the program and how they might go about having someone apply for projects such as this? Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Deputy Chair, on a year-to- year ba sis we have used the pmgram som ewha t differe ntly, I am advised.

From time to time we have used it strictly internally to government to give people inside government opportunities to do other things and develop their skills in governm ent. There have been occasions where we have used it externally to bring people in from outside of the system to give them experience in working in governmen ts. We have used it in both ways, and we have adver tised it accor dingly depending on the plans and the needs and the information that has flowed to the staff who operate the program . Ms.

Gray: Still on the line of Affirmative Acti on, does the minister happen to have the numbers of the -and I can appr ec iate that wit h de puty ministers they may be political appointme nts or they ma y not be-but the break down of the affirma tive action target groups and the number in relation to the number of deputy ministers? Mr. Praznlk: Mr.

Depu ty Chair, in terms of deputy ministers one has to be careful because, of course, I am not sure who has ma de a decl aration and who has not, but I am advised that two of our deputy ministers have made declarations as being part of visible minority commun ities, and we have one deputy minister who is a woman. We had two who were women.

My form er Depu ty Minis ter of labour, who is here tonight to cheer us on, has since left her deputy minister position to take up a promotion as the pr esident of the Economic In novation and Technology Council and has obviously used her experience in that portf olio well to catch the at tention of the Pr emier and be appointed to what is an obvious promotion to do some very important work in the province. So the depu ty minis tership in this case was good training ground for a very fine individual. Ms. Gray: Mr.

Deputy Chair person, I thought when the minister started his remarks, he said one has to be careful, and I thought you were going to say we never know from one minute to the next who the depu ty ministers are because then they change. Just one final question for the min ister. I am wondering if he could indicate to us as Minister responsible for the Civil Service Commis sion, as one of his responsib ilities, over the next year what would he like to acc omplish in terms of three or four reforms or goals within his department.

If he could perhaps give us an indication of what he would like to see accomplished over the next year, everything willing, I would leave the Estimates with that question for the minister.

5061 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OIF MAN ITOBA July 5, 19 93 Mr. Praznlk: Mr. Depu ty Ch air, that is a very intriguing question in the Estimates process. I think a couple of things. One is, we have worked very, very hard as a dep artment. Our staff have put out just above and beyond the call of duty in ensuring that in the Workforce Adjustment process we have managed to find opportunities for those people whose positions have been affected by budget reductions.

We have no idea what next year's budget holds for us, but I cer tai nly consider, as a prio rity, maintaining that type of service so that ultimately at the end of the day, when we are going through whatever kind of reduction process in governmen t that all governments are going through at this time, we are able to ensure that as many people who still want to be em ployed by government are at the end of the day, even if it is in other positions.

I am particularly proud of that effort, because one ask s the ques tion always, whenever you go thr ough a downsizing and people's li ves are affec ted, and I know my colleagues the Premier (Mr. Filmon) and other members of cabinet always ha ve that conce rn. When you ar e red ucing government, you are affecti ng individuals. If you are elimi nating those positions, you are depriving them of their livelihood potentially.

When you are able, through such good work as we have on the part of our staff , to know that the vast majority of those people still have a job at the en d of the day, and you have acco mmodated several hundred people who have wanted to lea ve government to retire or do other things, and you have ac commodated them with the VSIP program , when you go home at night, at le ast you are able to look yourself in the mir ror and say, yes, we have had to make some tough decisions. Yes, we have had to elimin ate positions, but we know that we have really truly minim ized the effect on many, many people.

So I am proud of that, and I always want to ensure our civil service is able to mai ntain that kind of service. * (221 0) A longer ha ul, a more positive issue I think though is, as Civil Service minister, I want to ensure that we provide within gover nmen t ple nty of opportunities, as ma ny as we possibly can, to develop am ongst our em ployees opportunities to learn more about the operations of government in service' delivery. I think this is an area where we have a lot more work to do.

I have managed with my other hat as Minis ter of Labour with my deput ies, both Rober ta Ell is Grun feld and now Tom Farre ll, to give people in our department opportunities for career advance ment, opportunities to have management experience, but I think more importantly to develop, and I know some may have trouble with this word, a corporate view o1' government in the sense that one has to look at government from the whole perspective, not jus t the perspective of a nar row part of one's departm ent.

I knc:�w th at there ha s traditi onally been a tendency in bureaucracies over the last number of decado s, as people stay in one department of gove rnmen t, one br anch of government, particularly if they are manager of that branch, to view that branch as their terrain in which they have a respc• nsibility to protect it, to look afte r it, to fight on its behalf, without fully appreciating the larger view of what government or their department has to accom plish. What are the larger goals? Where are we trying to move and how are we going to get there? What is my part and my branch's

part in achieving that goal? So one area that we have discus sed somewhat, and we, want to get more into next year, and we certainly want to encourage departmen ts to pursue is the a1bility to give people, particularly our junior managers, people movin g in the syst em, the opportun ity to see other parts of governm ent operatiton to gain that larger perspective and to have that ability, when they do see that, to ask the questions about why are we doing things, have that larger objective. So that is an area we certainly want to work towar ds. I say this to the me mber from Cresce ntwood (Ms.

Gray) because I know her very sincere interest in seeing more opportunities for women in government. But if I would offer one bit of ad vice, and I have done this to Manitoba Women in Governmen t, I have said this to Man itoba Wo men in Governme nt, tha t to get more information, to be exposed to the basis on which government and policy decisions are made, to be able to learn the facts, in essence, and see the kind of number s that we have to deal with at a cabinet le vel, tc:> be able to adopt or adapt to changing circums:tances, to be innovat ive in program delivery

July 5, 1993 LEGISLATIVE ASSEM BLY OF MAN ITOBA 5062 becomes a great asset, I believe, in promotion in government. Because we as min iste rs, our depu ties are continually looking for people in management roles to come into ma nage ment roles, who can be innovative, who can take on new challenges, who are prepared to rethink the way we do things, find new ways of doing them and deliver, ultimately, better service to the people of Manitoba, people who are not caught in the old ways of doing things, are not rel uctant about viewing new ways of doing things and new challen ges.

So that is a particular objective that we want to be encouraging and working towar ds, and I think that builds a stronger and better public service for the people of Manitoba. I know my colleagues in cabinet wish to pursue that in their particular dep artme nts and buil d that sense of ver y innovative leadership within our staff. That is a goal that I think serves the people of Manitoba well, and we have moved a long way towards that in the last number of years. We have seen some excellent managers come through the system who are using their talents to that end.

I think we can have a pretty exciting public service in Manitoba as that develops. So that is a large goal. I think it ties very much in to the kind of goals I know the me mb er for Cr esce ntwood (Ms. Gr ay) shar es of more opportunities for women, for visible minorities, for others, because in that kind of dynamic, there are always opportu nities for those who wish to be innovative, for those who wish to work hard, for those who wish to work towards the larger objectives of the body of government which we now have to take on. So it opens things up somewhat, I think, and that is exciting.

I look forward to more work being done in that area over the next year. [inter jection] Ms. Gray: Mr. Deputy Chairper son, if the Minister of Health (Mr. Orchard) would just wait a couple of minutes, he will have his opportunity. I basically just want to thank the minister for his comments and thank the staff, as well, for their participation. Thank you. Mr. De put y Chai rper son: 1. Ci vil Ser vice Comm ission (

a) Exe cutive Office (1 ) Salaries $233,700. Hon. Rosemary Vodrey (Minister of Education and Trai ning): It is very important that we have an opportunity to talk a little bit about some parts of the Department of Labour and Civil Service. An Honourable Member: Is this going to be 60 hours worth of questions to make up for 60 hours worth of answe ring? Mrs. Vodrey: Seventy. I am particularly interes ted in the French Language Services Secretariat which has moved now into the Department of Labour, under the direction of the Minister responsible for the Civil Service.

I wonder if the minister could begin by telling us a little bit about his plans with that move now being put within his responsibility, certainly opens up some what I would believe to be opportunities, and as a 'minister who works very closely with the French Language Services in this province, I would be inter ested to have the minister provide us with a little informa tion and his view on that move. Mr. Praznlk: Well, Mr.

De puty Ch ai rpers on, I know we are all so busy as ministers there are not a lot of opportunities for us to speak, and this cer ta inly provi des an oppor tuni ty for us to exchange some views on some of these issues. I am very excited by that opportunity. I can say to the Ministe r of Education and Training (Mrs. Vodrey), firstly, I was very excited by the opportunit y to serve the people of Manitoba in that capacity as the Ministre, Minister responsible for French Langua ge Ser vices.

It is a ve ry challenging area as we move towards the implement ation, as the minister is very well aware, of governance for the Se ction 23 pare nts of Manitoba in the school area, a very exciting area, I think, the redress of a long-standing grievance in our province. We are also, I think, excited by the Premier's commitmen t to the active offer option for the provision of French language services throughout the province of Manitoba where there is a need for those services.

What I think is so exciting about where we are today is that we are able to achieve, I think, some major progress in the provision of those services to our Francophone community in Manitoba, without the division and divisiveness of previous days. We are able to do it in a spi rit tha t Ma nitobans have always been able to demonstrate, when left to set tle their issues on the ir own bet ween communities, one I think generally of good will. We are able to provide in a very meani ngful way to the

5063 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF MAN ITOBA July 5, 19 93 Francophone community of this province and will be providing to them a host of government services that were never before available to that community. So it is a very, very exciting time to be in this area of responsi bilit y because we are fulfilling not only a constitut ional obligation, but I think for those of us who have some sense of the history of this province, and memb ers may want me to review a little of that history-! see some memb ers nod where we are in some ways righting some historic wrongs.

In the his tory of this province one should not forget that Fre nch-speaking Ma nitobans were clearly a ma jority of the population, at least half the population at the time that Manitoba was founded in 18 70. In fact, it was many Franco-Manitobans, the Metis communi ty, Louis Riel, who were ins t rumen tal in petiti oning Ottawa to create a province in the northwest and ultima tely petition Parliament, which resulted in the founding of the Mani toba Act. So it is exciting, despite a history that did not allow for many of those obligations to be met.

We here in a Progressive Conserva tive government led by Pr emier Gary Filmon are righting many of those wrongs in a positive way in which I think the vast majority of Manitobans concur and indeed are very proud of. So I am very excited at this time. Mrs. Vodrey: I am al so interested, as I see described in the Suppleme ntary Estimates, that part of the minister's role is liaison and a contact with the Franco-Manitoban community. Certainly as Minister of Education and Tr aining, that regular contact with the Franco-Manitoban community has been very important.

Certainly the major initiative that we have under way now moving into a system of francophone governance, which is an historical event in the province of Manitoba, has really led us to have ma ny mee tings and opportunities to discuss the goals of French language educatio n, particularly French first language education on behalf of Manitobans. *

(2220) Our dis cussions have focused not only on some of the technical issues '!ll hich, creating that, would lead us to, but it also has allowed us to focus on, again, the wider issues of hopes and dreams of those Franco-Manitobans for th eir educational system on behalf of themselves and their children. What I am interested in from this minis ter is perhaps how he would see with the community itself hi:s ongoing contact and liaison. He might like to speak a little bit about some of the contacts that have already occurred.

Some of the messages maybe he has received from the community about how they think and wha t they hope may be achieVEid. Mr. Pr:aznlk: Mr. Chair, I know there are some specific bits of information that I would like to provide in that way to the minister, which currently are in rny office, and I would ask if the committee may g1·ant me a brief recess of the committee perhaps or leave to obtain that information, and I understand our House leader has some comments on that particular point as well. House Business Hon. Cla yton Manness (Government House Leade1·): Mr.

Chair person, as has happened many times in the past in committees, for one reason or another, ministers canno t always be at the table until the comple tion of their Estimates. I under stand that the mi nis ter has some pressing busine!�s. and I am wondering whether or not there would be a will of the committe e, because this is very unpr ecedented, to start another committee realizing that we cannot com plete the Civil Service Commis sion at this time, but we will come back to it tomorrc>w- whether or not there is a willingness to entertain another department at this point in time?

I am thinking of In dustry, Trade and Tourism .

Mr. 04tputy Chai rperson : As the honourable House leader is aware, under Rule 64(1 ), "The Rules shall be observed in a Commi ttee of the Whole House ins ofar as they are applicable, except the Rules as to of seconding of motions and lim iting of number of times of speak ing." Also within the rules, under 65( 9)(d), the committee can not refer to another committee, but seeing as we are dealing under 64(1 ) which says we are dealing under the rules of the House at this time, I would ask if there is unanimous consent at this time to re ver t to the Estim ates of the Depar tmen t of In du stry and Tra de.

Is ther e unanimous consent? Mr. Steve Ashton (Opposition House Leader): Mr. Depu ty Chairper son, if we can track down our critic, we certainly have no problems. I would be interested in hearing the comments of the Liberal Party at this point in time. If we are operating under

July 5, 19 93 LEGI SLATIVE ASSEMBL Y OF MAN ITOBA 5064 the rules of the House, we cannot make reference to the absence of any memb ers. Mr. Deputy Chairperson: Is ther e unanimous consent at this time? Mr. Praznlk: Yes. Mr. Dep uty Chai rperson : Yes? Mr. Ashton: On the condition we can track our critic down, I can make no guarantees on that. That is the only potential problem we might have. I would jus t like to put on the record, Mr. Deputy Chai rpe rso n, that as a Civil Service cri tic , I completed my rema rks about two hours ago, and we were prepared to pass this committee and proceed to I, T and T tonight.

If there are any difficulties in getting into I, T and T, either due to rules or availability of minis ters, et cetera, I want it known on the record that we were prepared to deal with I, T and T tonight. Mr. Deputy Chairperson: So the Civil Service Commis sion then will be going into recess, and we will be going into the Estimates of the Department of I, T and T in five minutes, with the unanimous consent of this committee under Rule 64 (1). Agreed? Mr. Manness: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I just want to make it perfectly clear.

I asked for leave of the House today to begin other departments after ten o'clock, but that was on the expressed belief that we would be completing a department. We are not completing a depa rtm ent, and so this is why it is unprecedented at this time. If there is unanimous consent, naturally we would move on. Mr. Ashton: Mr. Depu ty Cha irperson, I cannot give you unanimous consent other than with the qualification that we can track our critic down. I cannot guarantee that. Mr. Deputy Chai rperson : Is that agreeable to the committee then, we will try to track down?

We will attempt to track down the opposition- Mr. Ashton: Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I am just aski ng. I am willing to give leave if we can get our critic. If we cannot get our critic in place- Mr. Deputy Chair person : Order, please. At this time, all we can do is advise the honourable critic that we are sitting in the Department of I, T and T, and if he chooses not to come to those Esti ma tes, that will be his answer. Mr. Ashton: Mr. Chairperson, reg retfu lly I will have to- Mr. Praznlk: Make a condition. Mr. Ashton: I have to give a condition because I do not know .... Mr.

Dep uty Chair person : On the condition if we can get the member in. Mr. Praznlk : And recess for 10 minutes. Mr. Dep uty Chair per son: And recess for five minutes to find the member. Mr. Praznlk: Make it 10 , mak e it 10 . Mr. Deputy Chai rperson : Ten minutes. Recess for 10 minutes. The committee recessed at 10 :27 p.m . After Recess The committee resumed at 10 :32 p.m . INDUSTRY, TRADE AND TOURISM Mr. Dep uty Cha irperson (Marcel Laurendeau): Or der, ple ase . As previously ag reed, the Comm ittee of Supply will come to order. The Departmen t of Labour has been recesse d.

We are now dealing with the Department of I, T and T. Today, in this

section of the Committee of Supply, mee ting in Room 255, we will be considering the Estimates of the Department of Industry, Trade and Tourism . Does the honourable minister have an opening sta tement? Mr. Steve Ashton (Thompson): Before we do proceed, Mr. Deputy Chairperson, I just want to indica te that our critic is, hopefully, on his way in currently. In fairness to our critic and others, we are quite prepared to start on the condition that we will adjourn no later than midnigh t. [interjection] That is fine, Mr. Deputy Cha irperson. I think we have a general underst anding.

We mak e the main point in reference to the rather unusual procedural aspects here. We want to ma ke sure that .t his matter is brought back at a future committee here, and we can deal with the exact .... Mr. Deputy Chai rperson : At the hour of 12 midnight, we will check with the committee to see what the will of the committee is at that time. The honourable mini ster to give us his opening state ment. Hon. Eric Stefanson (Minister of Industry, Trade and Tou rism): I am please d to have this

5065 LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OIF MAN ITOBA July 5, 19 93 opportunity to present the 19 93-9 4 fiscal year spending Estimates for the Department of In dustry, Trade and Tourism to the Legisla tive Asse mbly of Manitoba. The next fiscal year promises great opportunities and challenges for this governmen t and this province as we continue to move along the path to prosperity that we em barked upon some five years ago. The challenge we face is clear and well known.

We must continue our drive to economic recovery, and, as we do so, we must heed the tre me ndous changes occurring in the gl obal economy and ensure our development is in tune with those changes. As a gove rnmen t, we bel ieve our prim ary responsibility is to crea te a stable and positive fiscal environment in which all Manitobans can prosper. We believe the greatest contribution we can mak e in this area is in a balanced budget, and we hope to achieve that by fiscal year 19 96-97.

As our recent budget sta ted, our government has begun a four-year plan to elimi nate the provincial deficit through controlling government spending, modest increases in revenue, and fiscal transfer from the lottery revenue. We have now held the line on major taxes in our past six budgets, and we continue to seek ways to decrease the tax burden,

part icularly on smaller businesses and firms in certain stra tegic sect ors. In terms of reducing government spending, we continue to seek new and creative ways to deliver services effecti vely and at a lower cost . We have elimi nated some 1, 700 public service posit ions, mostly through early reti rement and attriti on. We have implemen ted a wage freeze. We introduced a reduced s

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Collection	Manitoba — Debates (Hansard)
Citation	35-4-94b
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Volume / chapter	35th 4th hansardpdf 94b.pdf
Language	en
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