THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Monday, February 2, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights met this day at 4 p.m. [ET] to examine and report on such issues as may arise from time to time relating to human rights in general.
Senator Paulette Senior (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Hello, everyone, and welcome. I think I can still say Happy New Year, as it applies to us.
Good afternoon, honourable senators. I would like to begin by acknowledging the land on which we gather is on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Anishinaabeg Algonquin Nation.
My name is Paulette Senior, and I am a senator from Ontario and chair of this committee.
Before we begin, I would like to ask all senators to consult the cards on the table for guidelines to prevent audio feedback incidents. Please make sure to keep your earpiece away from all microphones at all times. We ask that you kindly do not touch the microphones. They will be turned on and off by the console operator. Please avoid handling your earpiece while your microphone is on. You may either keep it in your ear or place it on the designated sticker. Thank you for your cooperation.
Let me begin by first inviting my honourable colleagues to introduce themselves.
Senator Arnold: Good afternoon, Dawn Arnold, I’m a senator from New Brunswick.
Senator Robinson: Good afternoon and welcome. I’m Mary Robinson, senator representing Prince Edward Island.
Senator M. Deacon: Welcome. It’s good to be here. I’m Marty Deacon from Ontario.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Before we start our official proceedings, there is a housekeeping motion that I would like to have someone introduce. The motion is the following:
That notwithstanding usual practice, and pursuant to Rule 12-17, the committee be authorized to hold today’s meeting without quorum, if necessary, for the purpose of receiving evidence and publishing evidence, provided that two committee members are present.
I would like to call on my colleagues to move that.
Senator Arnold.
Are we in favour, colleagues?
Hon. Senators: Agreed.
The Chair: I declare the motion carried.
Now that we have our introductions and you have your welcome, today our committee will be meeting under its general order of reference to discuss employment equity in the federal public service.
This afternoon we’ll have two panels. In each panel we will hear from the witnesses, and then the senators around this table will have a question-and-answer session. I will now introduce our first set of witnesses. Our witnesses have been asked to make a five-minute opening statement each.
With us at the table, from the Treasury Board Secretariat, we have Carole Bidal, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Employee Relations and Total Compensation. Welcome.
We also have Vidya ShankarNarayan, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and Culture. Welcome to you.
And from the Public Service Commission of Canada, we have Emma Orawiec, Vice President, Policy and Communications Sector. Welcome to you as well.
I now invite Ms. ShankarNarayan to make her presentation, followed by Ms. Orawiec.
Vidya ShankarNarayan, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and Culture, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat: Good afternoon, madam chair and honourable members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today as part of this committee’s study on employment equity in the federal public service. My name is Vidya ShankarNarayan, and I serve as Senior Assistant Deputy Minister for the People and Culture Sector within the Office of the Chief Human Resources Officer at the Treasury Board Secretariat.
I would like to acknowledge that I am on the unceded, traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg People.
I also have Carole Bidal, my colleague here, in attendance with me.
The Office of the Chief Human Resources Officer, or OCHRO, acts as the business owner for people management in the core public administration, driving excellence and ensuring the appropriate degree of consistency across the public service.
The sector I lead, People and Culture, provides strategic leadership, advice and support to build an agile and diverse public service in an equitable and inclusive workplace.
With regard to Employment Equity Act obligations, the Public Service of Canada has been subject to the Employment Equity Act since 1996.
The four designated employment equity groups are: women, Indigenous Peoples, visible minorities, racialized persons and persons with disabilities.
The Treasury Board shares responsibility with the Public Service Commission and deputy heads to implement the Employment Equity Act and achieve equality in the workplace for the four designated groups. This includes identifying and removing barriers, implementing measures to improve representation and reporting on progress.
Departments and agencies fulfill these obligations by a number of activities: conducting workforce analysis, reviewing their employment practices and policies, developing employment equity plans, consulting with employee representatives, monitoring progress and maintaining employment equity records.
With regard to merit, it is the foundational principle for appointments. The obligation to implement employment equity does not require an employer to hire or promote without the application of merit; merit always applies.
With regard to measuring representation, internal representation is based on data from those employees who have voluntarily chosen to self-identify for employment equity purposes.
Statistical measures — such as workforce availability, representation and gaps — provide insights into the diversity of an organization and the public service.
[Translation]
With regard to the progress report, each fiscal year, the President of the Treasury Board must submit a report to Parliament on the state of employment equity in the core public administration. The latest annual report covers the 2023-24 fiscal year. This report shows that, as of March 31, 2024, the representation of women, Indigenous peoples and members of visible minorities in the core public administration was higher than their availability in the labour force. Representation of persons with disabilities remained below their workforce availability. We expect the gap in the representation of persons with disabilities to close through planned improvements to data collection. Employees will be asked if they voluntarily identify with an updated definition that includes pain and mental health.
In the executive group, representation in all four employment equity groups was above their workforce availability.
Historical data reported in annual employment equity reports from 2010 to today show that the overall representation of the four designated employment equity groups has continually improved over the years.
These gains are not accidental; they are the result of intentionality, and a recognition that a public service that is reflective of Canada can better meet the needs of the people we serve.
In order to preserve diversity in the future, as departments and agencies implement Budget 2025 spending reduction decisions, organizations will hold responsibilities under the Employment Equity Act.
Even during periods of organizational change, including downsizing or restructuring, departments and agencies need to identify and eliminate employment barriers and ensure that members of employment equity designated groups are not disadvantaged. This requirement is built into the Employment Equity Act.
The Government of Canada is working to create a federal public service that is equitable, diverse and inclusive.
Budget 2025 specified that the government aims to streamline operations and reduce the size of the public service, while also emphasizing the need to protect its diversity. We know diversity is an essential lever of organizational performance, resilience and trust. There is always more to be done, but we are making progress through deliberate and meaningful action, and we will continue to do so.
Thank you, Madam Chair and members of the committee.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you very much. Now we will go to Ms. Orawiec.
Emma Orawiec, Vice President, Policy and Communications Sector, Public Service Commission of Canada: Madam Chair, honourable senators, as a former Senate page, it is a true honour to be back here today as a witness to appear before this committee on this important topic.
First, I want to acknowledge that I’m on the unceded traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people.
I am pleased to have in attendance with me as an observer, Nancy Porteous, who is Vice-President for the Oversight and Investigations Sector.
[Translation]
I would like to begin by briefly outlining the mandate of the Public Service Commission of Canada, or PSC. The PSC is an independent agency reporting directly to Parliament, responsible for safeguarding a merit-based, non-partisan and representative public service. We fulfill this mandate by supporting departments and agencies in hiring qualified individuals, overseeing the integrity of public service staffing and protecting the non-partisan nature of the public service.
Under the Employment Equity Act, the Public Service Commission of Canada shares employer status with our colleagues at Treasury Board. We fulfill our obligations under the Public Service Employment Act and Employment Equity Act through three primary functions: policy and support to strengthen understanding of obligations and flexibilities afforded to departments to achieve employment equity goals; programs and services to recruit the next generation of diverse talent through inclusive assessment; and finally, monitoring and oversight to identify any trends or barriers impacting our merit-based and inclusive hiring.
[English]
All three of these functions rely on close collaboration with departments, as their deputy heads are ultimately accountable.
These combined efforts help to ensure that staffing decisions across government support a public service that truly reflects Canada’s diversity, which is essential to public trust and effective policy-making.
The Public Service Commission’s role with respect to workforce adjustment falls into two main areas. The first is the establishment of the requirements for the selection of employees for retention or lay-off, colloquially known as SERLO. Since the last significant system-wide workforce adjustment, our legislation has been amended to include addressing biases and barriers in hiring. This important change was carried over to our recent amendments to the Public Service Employment Regulations, which establish the requirement for the SERLO processes.
Now when undertaking such a process, managers must conduct an evaluation to identify whether an assessment method creates biases or barriers that disadvantage persons belonging to any equity-seeking group. If a bias or barrier is identified, they must make reasonable efforts to remove it or to mitigate its impact on those persons. These regulations also require deputy heads, when conducting these processes, to identify essential qualifications that are most relevant for the work performed. They must also identify any current or future operational or organizational needs, which could include consideration for employment equity.
[Translation]
The second area where we have a role with respect to workforce adjustment relates to the priority entitlement program, which we are responsible for administering. This program supports the continued employment of public servants as they cope with career and life changes, such as returning from extended leave, workforce adjustment, or being medically released from the Canadian Armed Forces or the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Our commitment is to continue providing data-driven oversight, supporting departments in applying employment equity considerations both during hiring and workforce adjustment activities. Ensuring that employment equity is protected, not eroded, during periods of organizational change remains central to our mandate.
[English]
The Public Service Commission views this appearance as part of a renewed relationship with the committee. We are committed to being a source of independent expertise as you continue your important work on equity, human rights and addressing systemic discrimination in the federal public service.
I would be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
The Chair: Thank you very much. We will now proceed to questions from senators. This is our Q & A session. I would like to welcome Senator Marilou McPhedran.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you for taking the time to be here. I wanted to pick up on the point about using your services in essentially a consulting way to the committee. Did I understand that correctly?
Ms. Orawiec: We could come back. I know you are just starting your study on employment equity. We do our annual report. We have a number of audits. All this is publicly available on Canada.ca. We also tend to share it with committee chairs. We haven’t come to a parliamentary committee in quite some time. But my president or a member of the team would be happy.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you. I really wanted some clarification about what that would look like. From your perspective, would you need to have an invitation from us to engage?
Ms. Orawiec: That’s typically how it goes, although we do send, like I said, send audits and our annual report. If there were something in there that would be of interest to the committee, we would be more than happy. I think there is also the possibility of briefings, although we have not done one of those recently on a specific topic.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you. This is a question to all of you: Obviously, you can’t talk about the details, but is there any ongoing litigation right now on issues of equity directed at any of your respective affiliations in government?
Carole Bidal, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Employee Relations and Total Compensation, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat: I am responsible for employee relations and total compensation at the Treasury Board Secretariat. We are responsible, on behalf of the employer, to defend the employer in terms of litigation. In terms of staffing processes, there is the possibility of filing grievances if there was an issue with respect to a staffing process, and we do know that at various levels in the e-system some grievances that have been filed.
Senator McPhedran: There are some active cases. Okay. And is that litigation also handled internally with your justice lawyers, or do you send it out beyond the government?
Ms. Bidal: The grievance process is intended to start at the informal level, if at all possible, within the departments. Employees are represented by their bargaining agents, and the departments hear the grievances if they are not able to come to a resolution, then it’s referred to an independent third-party adjudication board with the Federal Public Sector Labour Relations and Employment Board. At that time again, employees can be represented by their bargaining agents, and the Government of Canada is represented by lawyers from the Department of Justice Canada.
Senator McPhedran: Is there an appeal process beyond what you’ve just described?
Ms. Bidal: If at the end of the grievance process there is still no resolution, it can be referred to the Federal Court for judicial review.
Senator McPhedran: All right. Can any of you tell me whether, in resolving differences in disputes, your legal representatives are using and/or your adjudicators are using or allowing to be used non-disclosure agreements as part of the settlement?
Ms. Bidal: At times, when it is appropriate to do so, yes.
Senator McPhedran: Who determines whether it’s appropriate?
Ms. Bidal: The parties to the agreements. The represented individuals filing the grievances and their bargaining agent or legal representative, and the representatives from the employer.
Senator McPhedran: Do you ever have a situation where individuals are engaged in pursuing a particular complaint or concern and they are not represented by the bargaining agent? Or this is strictly something that is contained within the union representation process?
Ms. Bidal: If the grievance pertains to an interpretation of a collective agreement, they are always represented by their bargaining agent. If they are not, if it’s in relation to staffing, for example, they can be self-represented, but most of the time they will be represented by their bargaining agents. I can tell you that, in the framework for labour relations and the federal public service, the intent of the administrative process is to try and restore the confidence or the bond of trust between the employer and the employee, and the employer and the bargaining agents. The idea is to try and resolve it informally where possible. There are informal dispute-resolution processes that apply at various stages in the process so non-disclosure agreements can help permit the parties to that particular grievance to come to an agreement without necessarily creating a precedent moving forward.
The Chair: That is time. Would you like to go on second round?
Senator McPhedran: Yes, please.
Senator M. Deacon: Thank you for being here today and with your support. It’s really important work.
I will tell you that I am a guest today on this committee, so I don’t have the deeper background. But I have, in my former life, worked away at employment equity with nine labour groups and about 10,000 employees, so I get a sense of the pillars and the types of things that you’re talking about, and it’s interesting reading the materials ahead of time. I have a couple of questions that might be at the 20,000- or 30,000-foot level — or they might even be a little bit closer to the ground — that I’m wondering if you can help me with, especially when I heard 1996 and that being 30 years ago, which is I think important.
In addition, is the evidence that you wish you were able to collect that you actually haven’t been able to collect yet? If you’re looking forward, and these are the things that we’ve been looking behind us, are there aspects of evidence that you think would continue to give a more fulsome picture of this work moving forward? That’s the evidence question. And what might be getting in the way of the work that you’re trying to achieve as much as you can say appropriately? It’s open to all of you, please.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I will start, and then my colleagues may wish to jump in.
With regard to your first question, Madam Chair, on an ongoing basis, we do the workforce analysis of the data that we receive from all departments and organizations. We look at the workforce analysis as well as we study the feedback we receive from the employee representatives. It’s my team that is actively working on how we can further modernize the identification of data. So we are currently working on the analysis of that, and we know that it’s an ongoing process. This has happened in the past as well, maybe well before we were at the table.
We’re hoping that, in the next little while, that we’ll be able to provide more information on how we could further modernize how we collect employment equity data from the public service.
To your second question, what gets in our way? I would say that, fundamentally, it is self-identification of the employment equity data. I wouldn’t describe it as getting in the way. It is really up to our employees who are in the four designated employment equity groups to voluntarily self-identify. The more and more employees, when they self-identify, we are able to have, I will say, rich data across the government that we can then further leverage to meet our obligations of the legislation. I would invite my colleagues to see if they would like to add on.
Ms. Orawiec: I think, similarly, our data relies on self-identification. If someone chooses not to identify as an equity-seeking group, then they wouldn’t be picked up in the workforce representation comparison.
Also, I think we struggle with intersectionality. Sometimes the data is just the four groups, so it’s harder to drill down into the dynamics when you start to get into more layers to the data.
Senator M. Deacon: Thank you. The self-identification, you both touched on it; it’s pretty important, and it does rely on certain conditions and people coming forward. It’s also across different projects and workforces, different things in the federal government that they need self-identification for. Are there any strategies, any things that you can do to dig, to pursue that? We had an issue in Veterans Affairs Canada where it was a big challenge, and what could we do to get that data that we don’t have? I wonder if there is anything strategy-wise that could help you out?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: Every deputy head encourages their ministry or their organization to ensure that their employees feel safe and feel included when they are self-identifying within the four employment equity groups. I would say it’s an ongoing recommendation, and, on a regular basis, from the Treasury Board’s OCHRO, we provide guidance and communication material to the deputy heads that they can share with their employees to ensure that number one employees know it is confidential information. That confidentiality and the privacy of the data, we ensure that not only do we put all the right guardrails in place, but that employees become more and more aware of the confidentiality and privacy of their data. That is an ongoing item, so we do it, I would say, very regularly. We’ve made progress over the years, but as we have more and more people joining the public service and people retiring, this is going to be an action that we will continue to do.
Ms. Orawiec: I think, from our perspective, we have three major groups of clients. We have students who are applying to jobs, and we have current public servants who are looking for mobility and promotional opportunities within the public service. We also have external applicants, so it’s a little bit of a different approach, depending on if this is a known concept to you or if there is education and outreach required. I think we’re trying to reinforce the same message that although it’s voluntary, it’s important information that we protect and safeguard. We try to find the right employment equity meeting workforce availability for all those three different groups of people who may be applying for public service jobs.
Senator Arnold: Thank you for being here and for this important work and some of the clarity on the data, but I think that — and maybe it isn’t a fair question for you, but we’ve seen the data here, and whether it is reported or not, the numbers are not really reflective of our society at large as far as the different visible minorities. I am curious if you have any insight on why the public service still struggles to attract some of these groups?
The second part — I was a bit taken aback by the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force and their 187 recommendations, of which I don’t think any of them have been put in place. I am curious where we are on that and whose responsibility it would be to do that.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: Thank you, Madam Chair. There are two questions. I will start with the first one. The last employment equity report that was published was for the fiscal year 2023-24, which was published at the end of that fiscal year. Right now, my team is getting ready to publish the report for 2024-25, which will be published before the end of this fiscal year, or around that time.
With regard to the representation of the four employment equity groups from Canadian society, we work with the Canadian census, and from the time we receive the Canadian census and the labour market availability and the workforce availability, it takes two to three years for us to have — so we go back two to three years. We are now trying our best to get the data on the Canadian population and the workforce availability as soon as possible. It is still a time lag to get it from different areas.
But specifically to your question, one out of the four employment equity groups, that is, persons with disabilities, there is a significant lagging behind. Two reasons — one, we definitely need to be making more efforts to ensure we are representative of society, and the second reason is a definition as well. From a definition perspective, within the public service, our self-identification definition has not yet aligned with the Accessible Canada Act’s definition that includes mental health and pain-related disabilities, which we have not yet updated. We are working diligently to make that update. Once we are able to make that update, the data collection becomes more accurate than what we have right now.
!To the second question, with regard to the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force, that review task force submitted its findings to the Department of Labour who is accountable for the Employment Equity Act Review. Unfortunately, it is the Department of Labour who has the accountability for it, so I won’t be able to answer it. Sorry.
Ms. Orawiec: From a staffing perspective, in our annual report tabled in December, we actually saw for external hires — that is, Canadians who are not already public servants — an increase in the proportion of external hire applicants from all of the groups, with the exception of persons with disabilities, which was below workforce availability.
Another important distinction is we are talking about representativeness and workforce availability, but if you need to have a different metric — let’s say you are delivering services to Indigenous people — then your metric doesn’t have to be workforce availability. You can hire more Indigenous people on that program because that makes sense in that context.
Senator Arnold: I do have a follow-up on that. Again, it’s probably not you, but we’ve all seen it in the news that there are going to be major lay-offs. How do we ensure that they are not done to disproportionately affect visible minorities or any of these equity-seeking groups? Is anyone doing that or having a look at it?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I can start, and then I will request my colleagues to jump in. So even during the period of workforce adjustment and reductions to the public service, the Employment Equity Act applies, and every deputy head is obligated to ensure that they conduct a workforce analysis while they are implementing any workforce reduction, and every deputy head is accountable for the employment equity of their organization. On an ongoing basis, we continue to provide them with recommendations as well as guidance to reiterate the obligations under the Employment Equity Act. Perhaps my colleagues want to jump in.
Ms. Orawiec: In a workforce adjustment process, if some but not all of the employees in a work unit are not to be retained, this is when the process that I referred to as SERLO — selection of employees for retention and lay-off — comes into effect. Through that process now, we have enshrined in our regulations the changes to the act to ensure that the methods of evaluation are free of bias and barriers. As part of an organizational need, deputy heads will determine what the requirements are for the work today and for the future. So they can decide what the qualifications, the needs and the requirements are to set for this evaluation to retain the employees that are to be retained, and then the rest would be laid off.
Senator Arnold: Thank you.
The Chair: I have put myself on the list because I have a few questions, and then we will go into second round.
I will pick a couple of questions. I can’t remember if it was you, Ms. Orawiec, who talked about the challenge of intersectionality. I would like to hear a little more about that.
I also want to talk about the recommendations. One of my colleagues mentioned that in terms of adding some groups who are currently not there, such as 2SLGBTQI+ folks as well as Black folks. I would like to have an understanding of where we are with regard to implementing some of these really critical recommendations, but also talk about the challenge of intersectionality.
Ms. Orawiec: I can go first. Right now, the Employment Equity Act identifies four employment equity groups. When we talk about workforce availability, those are the four groups where we are looking for people to self-identify. However, in our compliance of the overall staffing system, every two years we do the Staffing and Non-Partisanship Survey, and this is employees’ perceptions of merit, transparency and fairness. This gets beyond just the employment equity groups, so we can get into that data that would show the intersectionality.
Some of the challenges with the response rate on these surveys are, of course, you want to protect the confidentiality of the results. We are not always able to drill down. We have to be very conscious of that when we give the results to departments to make sure that people’s confidential information is retained. But we will be releasing the new version of the survey in the coming months. I encourage you to look at it because I think it will give you some insight into intersectionality.
The Chair: You are saying this is beyond the four groups, so looking at areas where staff cover a number of grounds?
Ms. Orawiec: Yes.
The Chair: Including ones that are not part of the four groups?
Ms. Orawiec: Religion, LGBTQ, Black employees. There are subsections that people can — when they respond to the survey, they can provide that data. We also do it at the Public Service Employee Survey level as well.
The Chair: Is that in place of the recommendation, or is that supposed to lead up to implementing the recommendations?
Ms. Orawiec: I think it gives us insights for audits that we will conduct into how we oversee the staffing system and also the guidance that we give deputy heads and their heads of human resources as well as hiring managers into what to look for when they are even developing criteria for jobs. We have said decreasing bias and barriers. We have done an audit on access in the pre-assessment period. So even the qualifications that you pick could impact individuals of certain groups more than others.
The Chair: Thank you.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I will continue with regards to your question, Madam Chair, on the modernization of the Employment Equity Act. I will speak a little bit about the work that my team did in the consultations, as the modernization rests with the Department of Labour.
In the summer of 2021, the Government of Canada launched the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force to suggest ways to modernize and strengthen the federal employment equity framework. In December 2023, the task force’s final report, A Transformative Framework to Achieve and Sustain Employment Equity, was released, with a number of recommendations. I have the list of recommendations, but I think you have them as well.
As you know, the Employment Equity Act applies to all federally regulated workplaces. On behalf of the Government of Canada, it was my team that undertook the consultations. The Department of Labour conducted consultations for all the other federally regulated workplaces. The Government of Canada is the largest employer in the country, so the Treasury Board — the Office of the Chief Human Resources Officer, or OCHRO — undertook in-depth consultations across the public service. We also worked with the Public Service Commission and with the Department of Labour as well. We submitted our report based on consultations with employees from across the government to the Department of Labour in summer 2024. We are awaiting the next steps from the Department of Labour when they are ready to share them with us.
The Chair: Thank you very much for your responses.
Senator McPhedran: I, too, am going to reference your recommendations. I would like you to share more with us. I realize that the details are not here, I don’t think.
In terms of your Employment Equity Data Steering Committee, how do you see that in terms of membership? How do you see that in terms of leadership within the committee?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: Could I just ask for a little more detail? How do we see the Employment Equity Data Steering Committee with regards to leadership?
Senator McPhedran: I have two questions. I am referencing recommendation 2.1, which says:
An Employment Equity Data Steering Committee should be established under the Employment Equity Act to support implementation, meaningful consultations, and regulatory oversight to achieve and sustain employment equity.
I’ve been around long enough to remember the Abella commission that led to the first iteration of this legislation. Implementation is always the issue in terms of effectiveness, so this is an interesting recommendation. I am just trying to understand it better. Perhaps it hasn’t been developed, but a committee that doesn’t have a clear mandate, clear authority or cross-sectional representation is probably not going to be a very effective mechanism for implementation. That’s why I am asking these questions.
How will the members be chosen? Where will they be coming from? Where is the leadership? It’s to get a sense of what this new mechanism would actually look like.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I will also seek any advice from my colleagues.
With the existing Employment Equity Act implementations — maybe I will speak a little bit to the existing Employment Equity Act before the modernization and actions for the future.
We have senior designated officials. Every deputy head assigns one senior designated official who is typically at the assistant deputy minister level — basically, the level of my colleagues and myself — from every department or agency. We have a Government of Canada-wide committee that is chaired by the Treasury Board. On a regular basis, this committee also meets with bargaining agents to understand representation, barriers, issues of inclusive workplaces and provide recommendations. That is one aspect.
Second, specifically from a data perspective, when every deputy head is collecting data for the existing Employment Equity Act, we conduct a workforce analysis of the data at the Treasury Board and prepare the annual report that is tabled by the president in Parliament.
Specifically to the question on recommendation 2.1, I don’t have it here in front of me, so I may be missing it. I am looking at my colleagues here. Is it based on the recommendations to the modernization of the Employment Equity Act?
Senator McPhedran: Yes.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: On the modernization of the Employment Equity Act, we have not yet received the go-ahead with regard to next steps for that from the Department of Labour. Only once we receive this will we be able to plan our implementation for it. We’re still waiting for those details.
Senator McPhedran: From whom do you need to receive the authorization to proceed?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: For the modernization of the Employment Equity Act, the Department of Labour is accountable to go to cabinet to seek authority for the amendment of the act. If and when they proceed with the next steps, then, on behalf of the federal government, the Treasury Board/OCHRO implements with all the deputy heads within the Government of Canada, and the other federally regulated agencies will seek direction from the Department of Labour, like we do.
Senator McPhedran: I just want to understand this a bit better.
When you reference the need for authorization to proceed, can we understand that these recommendations or certain of the recommendations have been accepted and that there has been a commitment to proceed, but it hasn’t yet been activated? Is that a correct understanding of the situation?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I would say no. From my end, I actually don’t have any information on what has happened with the recommendations that were provided to the Department of Labour. I would not have that information. It would only be with the Department of Labour. If any recommendations have been accepted or not, unfortunately, I do not have that information because that is directly with the Department of Labour.
Senator McPhedran: Again, to make sure I understand, to proceed with modernization of the Employment Equity Act, the essential first step is for the Minister of Labour to identify, if not these recommendations, what changes need to happen? Or are these recommendations the template from which the minister chooses?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: It would be for the Minister of Labour and their department to basically go to cabinet and provide their recommendations on what they wish to table. We do not know what their plans are because they have not shared them with us.
Senator McPhedran: Only the Minister of Labour can take this step?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: Correct. The Employment Equity Act is 100% with the Minister of Labour, as it applies to all federally regulated employers in the country.
Senator McPhedran: If the Minister of Labour does not take the step, then modernization of the Employment Equity Act will not proceed?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: We will continue with the existing act and with the existing groups.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
The Chair: Not seeing any further questions from my colleagues, I will jump in on the second round as well.
I want to clarify. I think I heard, and I’m trying to remember, with respect to the inclusion of pain and mental health. I would like to understand if that is to be included with people with disabilities.
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I can respond to that. Based on the Accessible Canada Act, there has been an expansion of the definition of persons with disabilities, which includes pain as well as mental health-related disabilities. We are currently working on how to expand that with regard to our persons with disabilities who work in the federal government, how they would be able to self-identify, including pain as well as mental health-related disabilities.
The Chair: Thank you. Another question I have regards the most recent initiatives of the 50-30 Challenge. Can any of you speak to that and where it is at the moment? Are you familiar with what I am asking about?
Ms. Orawiec: You can repeat it? I didn’t hear very well.
The Chair: The 50-30 Challenge. I am the only one who knows about this? No one knows about this? All right. Maybe some other witnesses will, so I will ask it then.
I’m looking at the data, and I thought, perhaps, that’s where Senator McPhedran was going, but I think she was probably looking at recommendation 2.1, which talked about the establishment of an employment equity data steering committee and what that steering committee would be made up of. I think we heard that the steering committee would be made up of senior staff, but the concern would be that the senior staff themselves would consist of the equity-seeking groups. I’m not sure that I heard a response to that. Because you said that nothing has been done on this by the Minister of Labour, now the Minister of Jobs and Families, we really don’t have any response with respect to that. Is that correct?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: With regard to recommendation 2.1, at this point, we are still waiting for direction from the Minister of Jobs and Families and the department with regard to the modernization of the act. Basically, we have a committee of designated senior officials from every department and agency for employment equity and for diversity and inclusion. That committee, which, as I said, is typically at the level of assistant deputy ministers, ADMs, or directors general, DGs. That committee fundamentally focuses on ensuring there are, as much as possible, employment equity groups represented as part of the membership of that committee, including the chair from the Treasury Board.
The Chair: Thank you. I feel that Senator McPhedran may have a follow-up on that, but I will go back to her after.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
The Chair: Looking at the stats and going back to the first question at the beginning, with respect to settled grievances and legal cases, I’m wondering if, in the past, whether or not any of that had to do with the inclusion of the groups in executive roles. I would like to get a sense of whether or not that is an issue within and among the public service.
Ms. Bidal: I hope I understood your question correctly. There are grievances that can happen at every different level within the public service. Most employees have the right to present grievances to the employer when the —
The Chair: I’m sorry to interrupt, but that’s not my question. My question has more to do with — and maybe I should ask a little less complicated question — the makeup of designated groups in senior executive positions and whether or not there is a significant gap that would then lead to grievances.
Ms. Bidal: I’m sorry. I am still not certain that I understand, but with respect to individual grievances, executives certainly are able to present grievances individually or in a group if they would like or if they have recourse under some of the other recourse processes that are available to them, like a human rights complaint. A number of different grievance processes are available to them.
The Chair: I will try to ask my question a third time.
Ms. Bidal: I am sorry.
The Chair: No, it is language. Sorry. Is there a significant gap in terms of folks who are from designated groups being a part of executive leadership?
Ms. Orawiec: I can speak to the data. In our annual report that we tabled before Parliament, all workforce representation in the executive workforce is actually exceeded across all four groups.
The Chair: All right, so that would not, at this moment, be a significant issue.
Ms. Orawiec: It should not be. We are exceeding accessibility for all four groups in the executive cadre.
The Chair: Does Senator McPhedran have a follow-up question?
Senator McPhedran: Yes, although my phone is about to die, and my question was on my phone. I will remember it. Part 1, at least, is easy to ask.
There is a high-functioning, high-level coordination committee that has operated for some considerable time at the ADM or DG level that has a pretty clear mandate to work on implementation of various aspects of the current act. Is there anything in your mandate that stops you from having your committee create a subcommittee that would actually start to look at data? In other words, is there anything that stops you from creating an alternative to fulfill recommendation 2.1?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: Just to be clear, your question is: Is there any barrier or is there any reason why the committee or a subcommittee cannot look at the recommendations to one of the aspects of the modernization of the Employment Equity Act?
Senator McPhedran: Not look at. Why not create your own subcommittee that could get on with the job and do this instead of waiting for a new committee? The desired outcome seems clear. The desired purpose seems clear. So why couldn’t you create, within the existing authority that you have, a subcommittee or something in which this work could get started and get done?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: I may have a clarification, but I will start. The existing committee is already working with our data teams on the existing data for the four employment equity groups. If I understood correctly, the question is: What is stopping the existing committee or maybe a subset of the committee from looking at data of the groups that were recommended to be included in a modernization of the act?
We are actually doing a lot of work with regard to Black employees and Black executives. That work we have already started. We’ve been publishing it in the public domain over the last few years, and you will see more of it because Black employees are basically a subset of existing visible minorities or racialized minorities. We have already been collecting and publishing data as much as we can, and we are continuing to look at what more we can do within the existing Employment Equity Act. Because “Black” is a subgroup within racialized minorities, it was an aspect that we were able to get started on sooner rather than later.
Generally speaking, and I will pick up an aspect that my colleague from the Public Service Commission spoke about, we are looking at doing more and more work on employment equity and inclusive workplaces, and we are doing more work with 2SLGBTQI+ data as well. We’ve started that. It is early days, but I would say we have made a little more progress for Black employees. We have a task force for Black employees. It’s the four-year task force, which is run from within my sector. We’ve been running mental health programs, as well as career development programs, based on consultations with Black employees and Black executives. We’ve also been collecting data on that front. We have started it, and with regard to all of the recommendations, or specifically with regard to recommendation 2.1, because “Black” is part of the existing Employment Equity Act as a subgroup, we were able to forge ahead on that front. For any further information, we followed the Department of Labour’s direction with regard to collecting any other employment equity group that came forward in the recommendations from the task force.
Senator McPhedran: To my ears, what you have described I’m really questioning why there — I mean, it sounds like you’re already doing — which is very logical — this recommendation without a steering committee, but you’re doing it. Are you doing the work on data across your committee, essentially as a Committee of the Whole, or have you established, for example, an informal working group to focus on data? How are you actually making it happen?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: The way we make it happen is we actually work with all Government of Canada departments and agencies because privacy is extremely important here. It’s based on self-identification, and we collect the data. There is very strict confidentiality as to who can view this data because we need to ensure that privacy is maintained at all times, and we analyze the data and we publish it in our annual report. That is how we are implementing it at this point.
The Chair: I found that last exchange very helpful in terms of clarifying some of the things we’ve been trying to poke away at. So that’s very helpful.
I hear the progress that you’re making, particularly with Black employees, and it’s part of the future modernization, and because they’re already included in minorities, but I know that 2SLGBTQIA+ folks are not. So I’m just wondering what’s the process that you’re utilizing to move forward on that piece, seeing that it is a glaringly missing group that’s not included?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: The reason we were able to start collecting for Black employees is because we already had the authority to collect it as part of the existing Employment Equity Act because Black is a group within racialized or basically within visible minorities. With regard to any other groups that are not part of the existing Employment Equity Act, unfortunately, we don’t have the authority to collect that information.
Senator McPhedran: So it’s your conclusion that the more general purpose aspects of the Employment Equity Act do not give you the authority to reach out, through data which you collect, to identifiable groups that are logically part of the employment equity? You have to have them specifically named before you can do anything to address what they may be experiencing. Is that what you’re telling us?
Ms. ShankarNarayan: The Employment Equity Act, which is for all federally regulated workplaces and it gives every employer the authority to collect data that is voluntarily provided by employees for the four designated groups only. At this point, that is what we have actually been collecting. The authorities, which come from the Department of Labour, are very clear. Unfortunately, at the Treasury Board, on behalf of the Government of Canada, we do not have the authority to collect employment equity data beyond the four groups and the subgroups that are in the existing act.
The Chair: Thank you to all three of you for your testimony today. You have helped to shed more light in terms of the questions that we have in mind. I’m pretty sure we have a lot more questions, but we really appreciate you being here.
I will now introduce our second panel. Our witnesses have been asked to make an opening statement of five minutes each, which will be followed by questions from the senators. With us at the table, we have Adelle Blackett, Professor of Law and Chair of the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force. Welcome. From the Public Service Alliance of Canada, we welcome Sharon DeSousa, National President; and Seema Lamba, Human Rights Officer, Human Rights, Health & Safety and Education Section. Also with us at the table, from the Canadian Association of Professional Employees, we have Sydney Holmes, Member of the National Executive Committee; and Mireille Vallière, Labour Relations Officer.
I now invite Ms. Blackett to make her presentation, followed by Ms. DeSousa and Ms. Holmes.
Adelle Blackett, Professor of Law and Chair of the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force, as an individual: Thank you, Madam Chair, for the invitation to appear before this Senate standing committee.
I must underscore that I speak exclusively in my personal capacity as a professor of law. As you know, I served as Chair of the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force and prepared its report from 2023.
My core message is this: In contexts of retrenchment, employment equity matters as much as ever if not more than ever. In this world moment in which commitments to plural societies are facing sustained challenges, we must be attentive to ensuring that Canada’s constitutional commitments to substantive equality and — let me underscore this — employment equity is central to how section 15 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms has been interpreted since its entry into force in 1985. It is grounded in international human rights law, and equality is at the core of our understanding of employment equity and how retrenchment must be approached.
We must keep our focus on the adverse impact on employment equity groups, and design policies and measures that safeguard and even reinforce the gains made across employment categories in the federal public service. This is especially true for senior management. Permit me to remind you that the federal public service holds a particularly significant symbolic role, often held out as reflecting the best of what inclusion means in our plural society and being a model for other Canadian provincial and territorial jurisdictions, as well as to Crown corporations and the private sector.
We should not forget that the first employment equity program, as it were, was to ensure that francophones were equitably included in the federal public service — and employment equity for women and those we are still referring to as visible minorities — racialized persons; persons with disabilities; and First Nations, Métis and Inuit persons — are covered in the current framework.
The commission’s highly anticipated report was committed by our task force, which was independent and arm’s length, in April 2023. It was released publicly in December 2023. It followed extensive consultations. I’ll reiterate that there were 51 meeting days; 109 consultations; 337 attendees; 176 employer and worker organizations, civil society representatives, experts, governmental departments and agencies that are broadly representative of Canadian society.
The message that came through was clear — I want to underscore this: We must cease to think of employment equity as somehow inherently divisive. The 500-page report was consensus-based of the 12 task force members who also represented business, labour, Indigenous communities and civil society writ large. It was notably based upon the broad consensus that employment equity is critically important for our societal fabric. It should not only be sustained but actually achieved. Employment equity benefits society as a whole. It’s about a vision of inclusion that we have for our society, and it takes all of us.
Drawing upon the fact that, 40 years ago after the first legislation that was adopted and, as was mentioned earlier, 30 years after its application to the federal civil service, employment equity has not been achieved. The report builds out the following three part framework to ensure that it meets its goal.
The first is barrier removal. Employment is a proactive mechanism. It’s not enough to line up individual accommodation as a response. Substantive equality requires close attention to removing discriminatory barriers across the employment life cycle that stand in the way of equity inclusion to historically marginalized groups.
It should be noted that subsection 8(4) of the Employment Equity Act provides that workforce adjustment measures implemented by the Treasury Board themselves are not employment barriers. That does not mean that anything goes; I want to suggest that the workforce adjustment measures need to be adopted and implemented in a manner that neither creates nor reinforces employment equity barriers from a substantive equality perspective.
The plans are critically important, and adverse consequences of measures can and must be avoided or reduced by engaging in the second pillar, which is meaningful consultations. That is imbued with an ethos of “nothing about us without us.” It frames the consultative dimensions of the current legislation. It’s precisely the time where enhancing meaningful consultations can help us to arrive at approaches in a time of workforce reduction that respect seniority and foster inclusion.
Third and finally, regulatory oversight remains crucial. I’ll be happy to follow up on questions concerning the data steering committee. The Employment Equity Act Review Task Force recommended the introduction of an employment equity commissioner, and I would suggest that this could not be more pivotal in this current moment.
There are other aspects; I’ve mentioned it’s a 500-page report. I don’t want to abuse the time allocated to me in these introductory comments, but I do want to underscore the importance of disaggregated data and data justice as approaches. There have been governmental commitments made upon the release of the report, in particular for creating new employment equity groups for Black Canadians, specifically, for 2SLGBTQIA+ communities, as well as addressing the definitional problems associated with disability to keep it in line with the Accessible Canada Act and adopting a distinctions-based approach for First Nations, Métis and Inuit persons. All of those elements warrant our dedicated attention.
Finally, I have just had the opportunity to meet with the Acting Chief of Staff for the Minister of Jobs and Families, the Honourable Patty Hajdu. If the Senate committee members wish, I would be pleased to update you on further information on the modernization process.
Thank you for your time.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Blackett. Over to you, Ms. DeSousa.
Sharon DeSousa, National President, Public Service Alliance of Canada: Good evening and happy Black History Month.
I would like to acknowledge that I am speaking on the unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquin Nation, whose members have lived on this land for millennia.
My name is Sharon DeSousa, and I am the president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, or PSAC.
The Public Service Alliance of Canada is one of Canada’s largest unions, representing 245,000 workers across the country. Over 180,000 of Canada’s workers are employed by the federal public service.
As your committee examines employment equity in Canada’s public service, I want to raise several concerns on behalf of our union. To be blunt, more work needs to be done to modernize the Employment Equity Act, and it needed to happen yesterday.
The data from the Treasury Board paints a bleak picture. From 2010 to 2024, employment equity gains were slow for designated groups in the public sector. For example, in data taken from 2023 to 2024, workers with disabilities remain significantly under-represented in the core public administration.
As of March 2024, racialized workers are represented only slightly above the workforce availability estimate, and this is based on outdated census information from 2021. Persons with disabilities, Indigenous Peoples, women, racialized people and 2SLGBTQIA+ people all face unique systemic barriers to equity in the workplace in Canada.
In addition, Indigenous and Black workers in the federal public service have been historically overrepresented in some of the lowest salary ranges.
It was this information, along with experiences of employee exclusion, discrimination and racism, that led to class action lawsuits being filed by both groups against the federal government.
We are deeply concerned about the potential impacts of ongoing workforce adjustment on designated employment equity groups, and it will deepen inequity in the staffing of the federal government.
Since December 2025, almost 12,000 PSAC members have received workforce adjustment notices that warn they may lose their jobs. To make things worse, there is no comprehensive equity data being shared with us.
To understand how workforce adjustment is impacting workers of employment equity groups, we need the government to provide accurate, detailed data.
Let me be clear: Cutting jobs with a lack of transparency about who is being cut undermines the very purpose of employment equity legislation. We are concerned that employment equity groups will be adversely impacted by the selection of employees for retention or lay-off, or SERLO.
We know that federal departments and agencies leading employment equity initiatives, such as Employment and Social Development Canada, or ESDC, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, or IRCC, and Health Canada, are being hit hardest by cuts. We fear the “last ones in, first ones out” phenomenon will mean that decades of work to make the federal public service more inclusive could be undone in a matter of months.
Our recommendations to the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force from 2022 are even more relevant today. We have recommended the need for better data breakdowns for equity subgroups. We also called for robust accountability and oversight mechanisms.
The Employment Equity Act Review Task Force did an excellent job incorporating our concerns into their 2023 report. However, the Minister of Jobs and Families has the responsibility to deliver on these recommendations and to ensure that the legislative framework is clear and robust.
The government must be held accountable for implementing these recommendations. The fact that there has been no progress in over two years is both alarming and disappointing. We need a strong public service workforce that reflects Canada’s diverse population, one that responds to the unique needs of our country.
Cuts won’t make this possible. Inaction won’t make this possible. We are pressing the government to sit down with us immediately to find sustainable solutions that will keep Canada’s public service moving in the right direction.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Over to you, Ms. Holmes.
Sydney Holmes, Member of the National Executive Committee, Canadian Association of Professional Employees: Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the members of the committee for the invitation to appear before you today.
I am a member of the national executive committee of the Canadian Association of Professional Employees, or CAPE, one of the largest public sector unions in Canada. I am joined today by Mireille Vallière, our Labour Relations Officer.
The Canadian Association of Professional Employees represents more than 25,000 professionals across the federal public service, including policy analysts, members of the Library of Parliament, employees of the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, civilian members of the RCMP and translators and interpreters. I would like to acknowledge the interpreters who make these proceedings accessible in both official languages, often while facing well-documented health and safety challenges. We thank them for their professionalism and commitment to democracy.
The Canadian Association of Professional Employees welcomes the committee’s study on employment equity statistics, the modernization of the Employment Equity Act and efforts to safeguard equity during workforce adjustment. These issues are deeply connected. Progress on equity is fragile and can be quickly reversed during periods of fiscal restraint and organizational change.
Current data show some improvement, but persistent gaps remain. Racialized workers, Black employees, persons with disabilities and Indigenous employees continue to be under-represented at senior levels. While hiring has improved at entry levels, advancement and retention lag. Workforce adjustment processes risk disproportionately impacting equity-deserving groups when decisions lack a strong equity lens and transparent data. Often the adverse impact only becomes visible once the cuts have been made.
As we observe Black History Month, it is important to acknowledge the lived realities of Black federal public sector workers, who continue to face systemic barriers, including limited access to acting opportunities and overrepresentation in lower-level classifications. Employment equity must translate into real improvements in career outcomes and leadership opportunities.
Pay equity is another essential pillar of employment equity, particularly in the lens of gender justice. While the Pay Equity Act represents progress, implementation has been uneven and slow. Many workers, particularly women in professional and language-based occupations, have yet to see results. Pay equity must be ongoing, transparent and enforced to prevent wage gaps from re-emerging.
Gender justice also requires addressing realities long overlooked in workplace policy, including menopause and perimenopause. For many workers, these medical phases have significant health impacts, yet remain stigmatized and unsupported. An equitable public service must include accommodations, flexibility and awareness.
Overall, CAPE offers three recommendations:
First, modernize the Employment Equity Act to strengthen accountability, expand designated groups, improve intersectional data, increase central agency oversight and introduce consequences for non-compliance.
Second, embed employment equity protections into all workforce adjustment processes through mandatory equity impact assessments with union involvement.
Finally, fully implement and enforce pay equity and gender-inclusive workplace policies, including perimenopause- and menopause-related accommodations.
In closing, employment equity is the cornerstone of a fair, effective, representative and credible public sector. In uncertain times, the federal government must uphold and strengthen — not weaken — its commitments. The Canadian Association of Professional Employees is ready to work with Parliament and stakeholders to protect and advance this progress.
Thank you, and we welcome your questions.
The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Holmes. Thank you all for your presentations.
Senator McPhedran: Thanks to each of you for coming to help us understand this better.
Professor Blackett, I would love an update. Let’s start with that.
Ms. Blackett: As you know, the report was submitted in April 2023, publicly released in December 2023. I’ve already set out the extent of the consultations.
Then there were internal consultations, and you had a reference to that in the earlier panel. There were different vehicles discussed in terms of legislative reform. To date, no legislative change has been tabled. My understanding is that legislation is being considered as part of broader reforms to labour law, but at this point it remains broadly framed.
One of the things I want to stress is that the recommendations — there were, indeed, 187 — do not all require legislative reform.
Senator McPhedran: Yes.
Ms. Blackett: That is crucial. Of course, you started to hone in on the data as a steering committee, which is an example, and then several of the subsequent recommendations fill in information about the level of the committee, which would be a high level, then the subcommittees that would be at the more technical level.
That would have significant oversight on ensuring that we have the data that we need and that we’re moving forward in a coordinated manner with Statistics Canada, with other entities, and with thinking about some of the measures that we use to assess whether equity levels have been attained in the federal public sector. Currently, the workforce availability measure — which has been roundly criticized and which we recommend abandoning in favour of a measure — is already foreseen in the legislation.
There is tremendous scope for movement across government. Certainly, one of the messages that came across when we did our consultations was that a whole-of-government approach needed to be adopted to achieve and sustain employment equity.
Senator McPhedran: Two interesting points that you have made. To my question about the update from the minister, would I be correct in understanding that the minister is considering the possibility of looking at recommendations and trying to decide whether she will do anything?
Ms. Blackett: There has been a lot of change since the report was first commissioned by Minister Tassi, submitted to Minister O’Regan, and then there have been two subsequent ministers in the portfolio.
Minister Hajdu is the minister who, in a previous life, introduced pay equity legislation.
Senator McPhedran: And Bill C-63 on harassment.
Ms. Blackett: My understanding is that this legislation will be looked at seriously. It will be important to have clearly communicated support for moving forward.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
Can you summarize for us what can be done that does not require the amendments out of your recommendations, a hypothetical?
The Chair: Can we keep that for the second round because she may have an extensive response?
Senator McPhedran: Yes, that is fair. Other senators may want to hear it, too.
Senator Arnold: This is fascinating. I was taken aback by seeing all of that and thinking it had been so long. I would love to hear more.
Ms. Blackett: Thank you, and thank you to this committee for bringing this to the forefront.
I was struck that this report was launched on the same day that you launched your report on the Canadian Human Rights Commission, Human Rights Day 2023.
A significant number of recommendations focus on the Human Rights Commission’s responsibility as an auditor for the Employment Equity Act. At the time, one could count the number of auditors on two hands with some fingers left, very devoted people but not able to cover the whole.
A number of recommendations in respect of regulatory oversight would require legislative change, but not all. One was on the startling discovery that the audits that were done were not communicated to the labour program. The labour program worked on implementation. The commission worked on auditing, and there was no cooperation. There were suggestions that there were limits on their ability to share information. The report discusses why that was more restrictive an interpretation than required.
One of the most striking aspects of the review came in terms of the interpretation of the actual obligation in section 5 of the legislation to achieve employment equity. The interpretation given was that one needed to put in place the plans but not actually to implement the plans. The interpretation was based exclusively on a reading that was, to my mind, unduly narrow of the English version of the legislation.
Once the French version was read, it was very clear that the obligation was higher, another example of where one would absolutely not need legislative reform, just a more attentive reading of both and then communication of that responsibility to the workforces that are being covered.
There is a range of recommendations around data, intersectionality and how one understands privacy legislation in relation to employment equity. All of these are matters of interpretation and implementation rather than strictly legislative reform.
This is not a short answer.
The barrier-removal dimension, which is at the core of employment equity, was also deeply flattened out in the implementation of employment equity, and yet that is the core of the legislation.
There is nothing new to saying that employment equity is about barrier removal. There are a number of recommendations in that, including a reflection on what it is that we actually mean about merit as it is used, and it is specifically used in respect of the federal public service.
The definition of merit in the legislation is not necessarily the definition that most people think of. The underlying assumption that there is an incompatibility between merit and employment equity is the biggest barrier of all.
The vision of employment equity is one that should be broadening how we understand the work that is done and who does it and thinking about why it is that one would have an overrepresentation of some groups and why that in itself is part of the challenge.
I will be very brief on this part, but meaningful consultations are so critical. Meaningful consultation is already embedded in the legislation. Many of the provisions have fallen to the wayside. Reviving the consultation dimensions is absolutely crucial to having equity groups involved but also to weathering a moment in which workforce adjustment is being put in place.
The Chair: That is time. Thank you.
Senator M. Deacon: Thank you to all of you for being here today. I’m trying to take this in and process it and get ready for the next question as we go. I would like to start, if you don’t mind, with Ms. DeSousa. There is no question that it is a large group you are managing in a really interesting, gut-wrenching time — absolutely, I think we acknowledge that — and the diversity of issues everywhere you turn.
My question is: You talked about increasing equity, and it’s taking so long, particularly in higher positions. Why, from your perspective? I have answers, and we all have answers, but from your perspective, why and how can we do better at that?
Ms. DeSousa: One thing I would have to say is that it is not centralized. What you have is department heads individually trying to implement this, and there are no teeth. There is no accountability. A department can, in fact, request, you know what, we are not able to get in our information, and we can’t provide you with our report, and there are no teeth to hold them accountable. This can continue year after year after year.
When we think of the report itself, we were talking about 2023, and here we are in 2026. When there is the political will to make change happen? An example was during the pandemic, when people needed money. No one knew how to get the money out, but they did it in three weeks. When we are talking about this, if there is political will, then there would be the teeth to get it done.
In terms of the different bodies and the work that they do, I just want to say that ESDC, who holds the Labour Program — I can tell you that there were over 1,700 lay-off notices provided to them. Will the Labour Program be, in fact, impacted? We don’t know, and we won’t know until the actual notification and people are removed from that department. That’s the problem — the lack of transparency. I would say political will is huge.
Senator M. Deacon: The trust issue becomes exponential; there is no question about that at all.
Chair, I think all of you were here for the first hour, taking it all in, so I won’t sit here and repeat all the questions from the first hour. But I wonder, during the first hour, how you might respond to some of the questions based on your workspace in your lane. Without repeating them, were there things that permeated for you, from the four to five o’clock shift, that you want to make sure that we hear from you today, perhaps more accurately? You might think you have an answer that adds to it. I want to ask you that. What do you take away? What do you want to add?
Ms. DeSousa: First of all, the Public Service Alliance of Canada has filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission on behalf of our members who self-identify as Black. The reason we did that is because, when you look at staffing, there are only two grounds that you can, in fact, make a staffing complaint. One is the abuse of authority. The second one is on language. So by changing the Public Service Employment Act to narrow it down, that’s the only recourse that we have. We have also filed policy grievances around racism with a variety of different departments. I found it interesting that none of that was brought up.
Senator M. Deacon: Thank you. Anybody else?
Ms. Holmes: I think Ms. DeSousa spoke to it well.
The Chair: That’s the end of our first round. I think I will wrap that up with a couple of questions of my own before we go to the second round.
Ms. Blackett, I have a question for you, and then I have a related question for Ms. DeSousa and Ms. Holmes, considering I have five minutes.
The first question I have for you is following up from Senator McPhedran’s first question about the meeting you had. Did you leave with a sense of hope or concern?
Ms. Blackett: In December 2023, when governmental commitments were made, I felt a sense of hope. We’re starting the year 2026. It’s a very different landscape. I think the case has to be made that employment equity is part of our constitutional framework, part of our very landscape and central to the plural society that we are building. The hope will come from what the many communities with whom we met do with this moment.
The Chair: Thank you very much. I’m not quite sure you got to the crunch of it, but I get the nuances that you have made. Thank you.
Ms. Blackett: I refuse to continue on the basis of pessimism. I think we are actors; right? Your holding this hearing is absolutely crucial. The report has been prepared. What is the action?
The Chair: Thank you. My second question is to Ms. DeSousa and Ms. Holmes. We heard a lot in the first panel with respect to workforce adjustment and the process. The lingering question for me is how you do that in light of “first in, last out,” as well as “last in, first out.” How would that be managed to maintain employment equity? Because I didn’t get a sense of that, and it seems that with 12,000 notices going out — do you have a sense in terms of your roles, how that would be managed? We will start with Ms. DeSousa.
Ms. DeSousa: Thank you so much for that question. I think it is extremely important. To give you a little bit of history, in the 1990s, when this first happened, I can tell you that, after all the cuts were done, it was Indigenous and people with disabilities — they noticed that they were not represented in the workforce. In 2012, when it was done under Harper, an assessment was done, and they noticed persons with disabilities were not accurately reflected in the workforce. This is by the cuts previously done.
Now, when we are looking at where we are at, in order for them to do that understanding, they need to know who is in their workforce, how they self-identify, what is their intersectional identity and what is their plan to be proactive?
I want to point out because I do have to say this — there is an idea that someone does not maintain merit going through this process. They were hired. They are deemed capable. All of a sudden, the SERLO process comes up, and all of a sudden, they are not meritorious. To me, that’s a form of discrimination, because they are. The difference is now they have to compete for a job position. There needs to be consultation with the union as well as with the oversight body. Right now, the Treasury Board is at arm’s length and saying it is the deputy ministers who are responsible. They are working in silos. That’s a problem. They need to work among each other to determine and to make sure those departments reflect society.
That lack of consultation and that lack of transparency — and I will tell you, every department has their own way of doing it. This lack of consistency is what is going to hurt us more than ever.
Ms. Holmes: I was just going to echo what Ms. DeSousa said, particularly about the siloed departments and the lack of transparency and consistency. I am a public servant, so we see, at the local level, how WFA is being implemented completely differently in different departments. Local unions are being impacted vastly differently. They are being treated differently. The legislation’s language is being interpreted differently, and there isn’t a lot of recourse available.
You can just see how easily employment equity can be abused and people can fall through the cracks. It just feels like a given at this point that this is what is going to happen.
The Chair: Thank you both for your responses.
Senator McPhedran: This may not be the place where you want to have this conversation, but it is the venue available to us. Going back to Professor Blackett’s point about the significant number of substantial recommendations that do not require legislative change, I want to link that with the other observation that we have not really stressed tonight, but I think it is on everybody’s mind. That is the cuts and the way of the cuts, the modus operandi of the cuts. I want to pair them to ask the following question.
In a hypothetical situation where the old-fashioned way of releasing people, going with seniority or going with whatever the managers want to do, drawing from these recommendations that don’t require a legislative change, what do you see as achievable to counter that tendency? We all know that the likely scenario is if that old-fashioned way operates, then much of what has been gained through employment equity will be lost. That’s my hypothetical.
Ms. Blackett: My answer will be quite short. It is very much to operationalize the meaningful consultation provisions in the legislation and take them very seriously in respect of this moment of workforce adjustment that ensures that the actors concerned are around the table and engaging with employment equity. The federal workforce also has quite an impressive array of networks that are present, reflecting and representing the various equity groups. They provide a vehicle for enhancing consultations.
Related to that is ensuring that the plans that are prepared are reflective of the obligations under the Employment Equity Act. It is that point, again, about transparency and the planning ahead so that we’re not simply finding ourselves in the face of an adverse impact. We’re actually planning, through consultations, to avoid the adverse impact, the whole point of implementing equity, a proactive approach to preserve, in this case, equity.
Senator McPhedran: Just a quick point of clarification on that. In order to see that scenario evolve, you need the minister, correct?
Ms. Blackett: In order to see that scenario evolve in respect of the federal public service, you actually need OCHRO and the Public Service Commission very specifically, which is why the whole-of-government approach is critical.
Senator McPhedran: Would anyone else like to speak to that question?
Ms. DeSousa: I would also say you need a culture shift. You would have to train every single one of your managers who are in positions of key authority on unconscious bias. It is not just the jobs that people apply for; it is also opportunities that are given, such as acting experiences, or hands-on experiences that they have access to. Employment equity is just the data, but they need to be able to move up through the organization. That’s where the issue lies, and it’s providing them tools to be able to make that shift.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator M. Deacon: We have more of the conversation that you offered around regulatory oversight. We’ve been able to do that quite a bit, and I appreciate that. I was also waiting for the word “culture,” and I can’t help but not think about that on everything that you folks are saying and how respectful I am of how important that is moving forward.
There is a question I’m still trying to understand — and it’s my ignorance. Ms. DeSousa, Ms. Holmes and Ms. Lamba, what is unique about what you are trying to do with your employee group? And what you are trying to do? Is there something that makes the challenges unique? They are very large groups, which is challenge right at the top. But what makes it unique? I imagine you folks collaborate and talk to each other, but what makes your working challenges unique to each other? I’m just trying to understand that.
Ms. DeSousa: Under the legislation, the Public Service Alliance of Canada is a union, and the unions only have a certain scope when it comes to what our rights are. We have collective agreements, and those agreements don’t necessarily include the legislation or how something is done. That’s the scope of our rights.
Now, we work with the federal government. There are a variety of different committees on which we sit, and one of them is through the National Joint Council’s Joint Employment Equity Committee. My colleague, Seema Lamba, is our technical adviser there, but I can tell you that the request for information on the impacts to the employment equity plan has been repeatedly requested and requests for meetings. However, the data isn’t being provided.
So when you look at scope and rights, who has the rights to the information? How is it being done? That’s the employer. Our scope is only based on the consultation and the transparency that the employer provides, and the recourse mechanism is the grievance or complaints process.
Senator M. Deacon: Thank you.
Ms. Holmes: Correct me if I’m wrong, but I interpreted your question differently than Ms. DeSousa did.
In separating CAPE from the PSAC, we represent very different employees of the public service. I’m generalizing, but those within PSAC are largely in charge of program administration, clerical work in general and mail rooms, which is not to say they also manage and can be at a higher level. CAPE’s largest group of employees falls into the EC group. They are policy analysts, such as the Library of Parliament folks who are sitting at the table right now, and some science folks. It’s a weird variety of analysts, basically, which is to say that we’ve actually been working really hard internally to get folks together. The employer has done a good job of siloing those two groups from each other, so there is a lack of communication.
Senator M. Deacon: It’s not easy. Thank you.
The Chair: We’ve come to the end of our second panel. Thank you for your incredible presentations and, more so, for your responses to our not necessarily easy questions. We’ve learned a lot, and we look forward to learning more in future meetings.
On behalf of the committee, I would like to sincerely thank you for taking the time to appear before us today. Your testimony will be very helpful to our deliberations and toward this study.
(The committee adjourned.)