The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) welcomed Tuesday's budget spending on housing, post-secondary education and a National Food Plan for students, but complained the federal bureaucracy will shrink from attrition.“We’re pleased to see measures in the budget that will support the important work of more than 34,000 PSAC members working in the post-secondary sector,” said Chris Aylward, PSAC national president.“But as Canadians continue to struggle to make ends meet, we need to put workers and their families first by supporting strong, stable public services when they need them most.” However, PSAC is concerned about the plan to cut 5,000 federal public service jobs through attrition. When $15 billion in spending cuts were announced last year, Treasury Board President Anita Anand promised Canadians public service workers wouldn’t be asked to do more with less and that there would be no job losses.Now it seems the bureaucrats will have to work harder.“The public service is only now recovering from the deep cuts of the Harper era and as our population grows, we need to continue investing in public services to meet the growing needs of Canadians,” said Aylward.“Investing in public services is the best way to avoid long wait times for Canadians at airports and at the border, for passport renewals and employment insurance applications.”The total number of bureaucrats in the Harper years actually grew, though not as fast as the population, as explained by a 2023 commentary for the Fraser Institute by Herbert Grubel, Professor Emeritus of Economics at Simon Fraser University."The Harper government’s economic policies were greatly influenced by the severe global financial crisis that started in 2008. In large part to deal with the problems the crisis caused, the bureaucracy grew rapidly until 2011, exceeding population growth by eight percentage points," Grubel said."After the crisis abated, however, the Harper government shrank the bureaucracy by a record-setting 10 percentage points, which more than made up for the large increases during the preceding four years. After that the number of bureaucrats levelled off."PSAC insisted that the pandemic proved strong public services are critical to see us through difficult times and Canada needs to continue to build on that investment to be ready for the next crisis."A strong federal public service anchors Canada's middle class and helps our economy weather the impacts of inflation," PSAC said in a press release.As more than 9,000 Canada Border Services Agency workers take strike votes across the country, PSAC is disappointed that the commitment to provide CBSA law enforcement personnel and firefighters at the Department of National Defence with equitable retirement benefits has gone unfulfilled. PSAC said it would also like to have seen more money to address the ongoing Phoenix pay disaster, strengthen Canada’s Employment Insurance system and stronger "tax fairness policies" to make large corporations and the wealthiest Canadians pay their "fair share."In the meanwhile, most PSAC employees are well-paid. In 2021, according to a study published by the Fraser Institute, wages alone in the public sector were 8.5% higher than those of their private-sector counterparts while the public sector also generally enjoyed more generous pensions and earlier retirement.PSAC is one of Canada's largest unions, representing nearly 230,000 workers across Canada, including more than 120,000 federal public service workers employed by Treasury Board, another 45,000 working for federal government agencies and 34,000 workers in the post-secondary education sector.
The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) welcomed Tuesday's budget spending on housing, post-secondary education and a National Food Plan for students, but complained the federal bureaucracy will shrink from attrition.“We’re pleased to see measures in the budget that will support the important work of more than 34,000 PSAC members working in the post-secondary sector,” said Chris Aylward, PSAC national president.“But as Canadians continue to struggle to make ends meet, we need to put workers and their families first by supporting strong, stable public services when they need them most.” However, PSAC is concerned about the plan to cut 5,000 federal public service jobs through attrition. When $15 billion in spending cuts were announced last year, Treasury Board President Anita Anand promised Canadians public service workers wouldn’t be asked to do more with less and that there would be no job losses.Now it seems the bureaucrats will have to work harder.“The public service is only now recovering from the deep cuts of the Harper era and as our population grows, we need to continue investing in public services to meet the growing needs of Canadians,” said Aylward.“Investing in public services is the best way to avoid long wait times for Canadians at airports and at the border, for passport renewals and employment insurance applications.”The total number of bureaucrats in the Harper years actually grew, though not as fast as the population, as explained by a 2023 commentary for the Fraser Institute by Herbert Grubel, Professor Emeritus of Economics at Simon Fraser University."The Harper government’s economic policies were greatly influenced by the severe global financial crisis that started in 2008. In large part to deal with the problems the crisis caused, the bureaucracy grew rapidly until 2011, exceeding population growth by eight percentage points," Grubel said."After the crisis abated, however, the Harper government shrank the bureaucracy by a record-setting 10 percentage points, which more than made up for the large increases during the preceding four years. After that the number of bureaucrats levelled off."PSAC insisted that the pandemic proved strong public services are critical to see us through difficult times and Canada needs to continue to build on that investment to be ready for the next crisis."A strong federal public service anchors Canada's middle class and helps our economy weather the impacts of inflation," PSAC said in a press release.As more than 9,000 Canada Border Services Agency workers take strike votes across the country, PSAC is disappointed that the commitment to provide CBSA law enforcement personnel and firefighters at the Department of National Defence with equitable retirement benefits has gone unfulfilled. PSAC said it would also like to have seen more money to address the ongoing Phoenix pay disaster, strengthen Canada’s Employment Insurance system and stronger "tax fairness policies" to make large corporations and the wealthiest Canadians pay their "fair share."In the meanwhile, most PSAC employees are well-paid. In 2021, according to a study published by the Fraser Institute, wages alone in the public sector were 8.5% higher than those of their private-sector counterparts while the public sector also generally enjoyed more generous pensions and earlier retirement.PSAC is one of Canada's largest unions, representing nearly 230,000 workers across Canada, including more than 120,000 federal public service workers employed by Treasury Board, another 45,000 working for federal government agencies and 34,000 workers in the post-secondary education sector.
