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| By Vanessa
Wen Producer: Ashlea Collis |
OTTAWA | Feb. 9, 2007 — Hiring by the Canadian government has failed to keep pace with the changes sweeping through Canadian society.
The Public Service Commission recently reported that in 2004-2005 one quarter of those who applied for federal government jobs described themselves as coming from visible minority groups, but only 9.1 per cent were hired. While the commission's response to the growing divergence between the makeup of Canadian society and the federal bureaucracy is to conduct a study of the question, others say the time for more studies has passed and action is long overdue. "We're doing the study because when you have a gap of 15 per cent, something is happening in there," says Tom Kelly, manager of media relations for the Public Service Commission. "We have some of the answers, but we want to see where in the hiring process people are dropping out," he says, referring to previous studies on similar issues. In 2000, Lewis Perinbam, who has had a career in the public service and in international organizations, headed a task force under the Liberal government called "Embracing Change." The task force recommended the government set a goal that one in five newly-hired employees be visible minorities. However, the Liberals never implemented that approach, and critics say the Harper government has not indicated that goal will be a priority.
"There is no room for discrimination in the public service. We are making progress and increasing our representation of visible minorities, since 2000," says Mark Quinlana spokesman for Vic Toews, Treasury Board President who is the minister responsible for employment equity. However, critics say there is a lack of commitment on the part of governments. "There is a perpetual situation in Canada where we tend to have the best legislation and policies, but we don't give them enough resources," says Fo Niemi, executive director of the Centre for Research-Action on Race Relations based in Montreal. Niemi says targets have not been met because there is a "lack of will to see to it that policies get translated into actions that see results." Departmental development Some departments fare better than others in hiring visible minorities. The Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages is at the bottom with 0.7 per cent of employees as visible minorities, while the Immigration and Refugee Board is at the top with 21.8 per cent. The Canadian International Development Agency has been a leader in minority hiring. In 2003, CIDA, along with other departments, received an award for creating a pool of potential visible minority candidates to sit on boards that made decisions about hiring employees. The number of visible minority employees has also been increasing, but only slowly. In 2001, they made up 7.7 per cent of CIDA's employees, while in 2005 they comprised 9.4 per cent. Even though the department says it promotes visible minorities through awareness sessions, events, and workshops, some argue eliminating discrimination in the workplace and in the hiring process across all branches of the federal government requires more than keeping track of numbers and holding workshops.
"I have experienced and heard of all the things the Perinbam task force discussed," says Jeanne To-Thanh-Hien, a visible minority who has worked in the public service for 14 years, and co-founded the National Council of Visible Minorities, an organization of federal public service employees who hold an annual symposium to discuss and promote visible minority concerns. She says she has heard stories from visible minority employees who face workplace inequality, barriers to career advancement, and lack of respect from their colleagues. "There could be a situation where a person has done a job for many years, and then a competition for a higher position opens up, but then another person who has come out of nowhere is selected because he or she is the preferred candidate," says To-Thanh-Hien. She has also encountered situations where people have been denied language training, even though someone less senior in their department has been allowed to have the same training. She says this can be discouraging for visible minorities who are hoping to get into the public service. Solving the problem Ravi Pendakur, a professor at the University of Ottawa who has conducted studies for the government on diversity, says one way to increase the numbers is to link meeting employment targets to the size of a manager's end of the year bonus payment. "Part of the problem is that to increase visible minorities, you have to bring in new people," he says. Pendakur says managers are more likely to hire those with whom they feel "comfortable," that is, people who look and sound like them. Niemi agrees, but says the problem is a combination of explicit and systemic barriers, such as how jobs are advertised. He also notes only Canadian citizens may be accepted to the federal public service, thus limiting many visible minorities from getting jobs. However, because 20 per cent of the Canadian population will be a visible minority by 2017, Niemi says these issues may become larger problems. "This is important because the state has a responsibility to reflect
the people. It's a fundamental principle of modern democracy."
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National
Council of Visible Minorities
