Public Service Alliance of Canada BC

OTTAWA – Conservative ideology has triumphed over the needs of Canadians in the latest federal budget according to the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC).

“This budget is a medley of misguided priorities,” says PSAC National President John Gordon. “The Harper government’s obsession with deficit reduction continues unabated with more than $10 billion going to pay down the debt this year, money that should have been invested in Canadians.”

“Continued debt reduction at a time when Canada may be facing an economic slowdown is not sound economic policy. Conservatives have once again missed an opportunity to use the surplus to invest in the health and well-being of Canadians through a national pharmacare or child care and early learning program or a comprehensive environmental protection plan.”

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On February 26 the Harper government will present its 2008 federal budget, making choices that directly affect the quality of our lives.

Up to now, this government’s budget choices have been very bad for many Canadians. Their tax cuts and overly aggressive debt repayment have reduced the level of public services that Canadians need and expect. Adequate responses to climate change, affordable housing, child-care, post secondary education, accessible health care, equality for women, minorities and aboriginal Canadians cannot be financed by their tax cuts and near-obsession with debt repayment.

Canadian families are working 200 more hours a year on average than only 10 years ago. Eighty percent (80%) of Canadian families are taking home a smaller share of the economic pie than families did a generation ago. Corporate profit is at a 40-year high, but that wealth is not being shared.

For these reasons and many more Canadians need to seriously reflect on the choices that the Harper government will make in the latest federal budget.

There is an alternative: A budget you can count on

Each year the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives consults with a wide range of community groups, unions and others to create an Alternative Federal Budget.

Its recommendations are analyzed and costed by economists who are as equally well respected as those the government depends on. They simply have different views about how the economy can help Canadians and how different choices are possible and preferable.

When the latest federal budget is released on February 26, you decide whether the choices the Harper government has made will really benefit Canadians.

Read more, including the complete alternative federal budget, at the national website.

OTTAWA – Conservatives are not the good fiscal managers they would like the country to believe and there is plenty of evidence to prove it. According to John Gordon, National President of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), Conservative budgets have been contributing to a growing gap between rich and poor Canadians.

“Why is it that, in spite of continued economic growth, poverty is still on the rise in Canada,” says Gordon. “Nearly one in six Canadian children live in poverty; one in four in First Nations communities. Our social safety net is disappearing and economic disparity and social exclusion are deepening.”

Since their election, Conservative budgets have been designed to provide a few ‘goodies’, such as the GST reduction and the taxable child care allowance, that are of little real benefit to individuals but advance the government’s agenda of undermining publicly funded services and reducing their role in meeting Canadians’ priorities. The money lost by reducing the GST by just 1% could have financed a universal early learning and child care system for three to five-year olds across the country.

At the same time the Harper government has been devoting large surpluses to debt repayment, they’ve been cutting social programs. Debt reduction will be cold comfort to the working families affected by the impending economic slowdown and who are even now living from pay cheque to pay cheque. Nor will it help new immigrants already clustered in low-wage, no benefits, precarious work.

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(Ottawa) The federal government should withdraw amendments to the Grain Act in Bill C-39 because it will hurt grain producers and it ignores the unanimous advice from an all-party Commons committee, according to the Agriculture Union – PSAC.

• Fax your MP - Oppose the amendments to the Grain Act!

The Conservative government’s proposed legislation will gut the Canadian Grain Commission (CGC), the independent body that provides essential services to grain producers. Bill C-39 will be debated for the first time in Parliament today.

The legislation ignores the recommendation of an all–party committee by immediately and aggressively cutting the CGC’s regulatory responsibilities and services. After extensive study, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agriculture recommended that the Commission receive increased funding to ensure that the essential services it offers to grain producers can be sustained.

“Instead of heeding the advice of politicians from all parties, the Conservative government is putting the future of farmers and of all Canadians who benefit from the grain trade at risk. This bill should be withdrawn and fixed before it is debated in Parliament,” said Bob Kingston, Executive Vice President of Agricultural Union - PSAC.

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The widely anticipated tax cuts announced in yesterday’s Economic and Fiscal Update confirm once again the Harper government’s preference for politics over meaningful public policy.

Betting that a $60 billion giveaway will give them a boost in the polls, the Harper government is playing shabby pre-election politics while furthering its agenda to shrink the capacity of government to act in the interests of all Canadians.

Massive tax cuts for the corporate sector – cuts that will take Canada’s rate to the bottom of industrialized countries by 2012 – are no substitute for investments in the nation’s social and physical infrastucture.

While the Harper government seeks to portray its single-minded focus on tax cuts and debt reduction as evidence of sound financial management, in fact the government’s approach is both unbalanced and risky – ignoring the needs of the majority of Canadians right now and endangering the country’s finances in the event of an economic downturn in the future.

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While Stephen Harper paid lip service to the ideals of peace, order and good government, the October 16th Speech from the Throne does little to promote these ideals in concrete terms.

Announcing a legislative agenda that prominently features deregulation, broad-based tax cuts, self-imposed limits to federal spending along with inaction on the environment, poverty and the growing prosperity gap, the Harper government has served notice that it intends to degrade existing public services and severely limit the government’s ability to address emerging needs in the future.

The Public Service Alliance of Canada says the government has got it wrong. The Harper Conservatives continue to fail to understand that enlightened investment in people through stable funding for programs and public services is one of the hallmarks of a progressive, modern society and the birthright of every Canadian.

In the wake of enormous budget surpluses, the government’s failure to invest in Canada and in the health and welfare of all citizens is a national embarrassment. Canadians deserve better!

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Ottawa–Canadians are outraged at the $5M cuts to Status of Women Canada (SWC) and the changes in the guidelines which saw the elimination of funding for research and advocacy for women’s equality rights.

To add insult to injury, under the guise and premise of “achieving efficiencies” at SWC, the government has decided to eliminate almost half its workforce across the country.

“How can Minister Oda expect Canadians to believe that she and her government are acting in the best interests of women? We are calling on this Minister to resign. She simply cannot profess to represent Canadian women, nor can she claim she is defending women’s equality” stated Robyn Benson, PSAC Officer responsible for women’s rights.

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Women in Canada Want Answers

(Vancouver - November 22, 2006) Women in want to know details of the $5 million cut to Status of Women. There is growing concern that regional offices may be closed and that regional staff may be pink slipped. The fate of the long established, independent research fund also remains unknown.

Since the announcement in September 2006, women across the country have not been informed about which parts of Status of Women’s functions will be cut. “We know that Minister Oda has been presented with some options, but the women of Canada have had no input,” says Alison Brewin of West Coast Legal Education and Action Fund. “It seems that the ways in which women’s equality will be protected and advanced in Canada is being decided without any involvement of women themselves.”

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Prime Minister Stephen Harper today established an Advisory Committee of nine eminent Canadians to advise him and the Clerk of the Privy Council on the renewal and future development of the Public Service of Canada. The Advisory Committee will also report annually as part of the Clerk’s report to the Prime Minister on the state of the Public Service, which is tabled in Parliament.

“The public service must continue to adapt to meet the changing realities of Canadian society and be well equipped to best serve Canadians in the coming years,” the Prime Minister said. “This is particularly true as the current baby boom generation retires. The future development of the Public Service requires sound advice, innovative solutions and strong support from both within and outside government.”

Read more at pm.gc.ca.

Ottawa: FAFIA, a pan-Canadian alliance of women’s and human rights organizations, is denouncing the $5 million cut to the federal department of Status of Women over two years. These cuts will be taken from its modest annual budget of $13 million. The grants and contributions arm ($11 million) of the department was not affected.

“These cuts will critically affect the federal government’s own capacity to live up to its equality commitments to women,” said Shelagh Day, Co-Chair of the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action (FAFIA).

FAFIA is also dismayed by the elimination of the Court Challenges Program. “This Program has provided women in Canada with their only access to the use of their constitutional equality rights,” said Shelagh Day. “Equality rights have no meaning in Canada if women, and other Canadians who face discrimination, cannot use them.”

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The Public Service Alliance of Canada, like the rest of the country, is angered by the Conservative government’s September 25th announcement that they are cutting programs and spending, while racking up a record surplus of $13.2 billion. PSAC National President John Gordon indicated that while the union is in the process of analysing the details of the government’s cuts, it does mean bad news for Canadians who depend on social services and a strong public service.

• News: Federal spending cuts attacked @ canada.com

Announcement by announcement, the government is revealing its true agenda, says Gordon. The Conservatives are shedding the moderate image they cultivated during the last election and showing their true colours by eliminating or cutting social programs and programs that support human rights and advance womens equality. Gordon noted that research, literacy and youth programs are also victims of this latest announcement.

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This Labour Day, PSAC reaffirms its commitment to helping build a just, inclusive, secure and prosperous society for workers and their families by defending quality public services. While challenging, this is a goal that we must achieve for the good of working Canadians across the country.

The Conservatives came into power earlier this year inheriting a strong economy, with low unemployment and a hefty budget surplus. Instead of building on these gains, the Harper government shifted to full reverse by implementing its declared priorities, which are designed to help the Conservatives win a majority in the next election rather than to respond in a sustainable way to what Canadians really want and need.

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OTTAWA - The federal government is refusing to release hundreds of pages of information regarding options for potential job cuts in the public service.In May, CanWest News Service made a specific request under the Access to Information Act for government documents which ”analyse or discuss job cuts in the public service, or the moving of positions out of the national capital region.”

Of the 484 pages identified as relevant to the request, only four containing benign talking points were released. They say only that government departments are ”developing options to restrain spending growth, while minimizing disruptions to the delivery of programs and services.”

To keep those options out of the public eye, Privy Council Office bureaucrats turned a Section 69 exemption under the access act, which apply to what the government considers cabinet confidences. It is the only one that can’t be reviewed by Canada’s information commissioner to ensure the censorship is legitimate.

Although the Stephen Harper-led Conservatives have said on numerous occasions that billions in proposed spending cuts will be ”friendly” to the public service, the union representing federal bureaucrats has expressed fear that longer-term plans may involve layoffs.

John Gordon, president of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, said in an interview the government’s refusal to release so many pages leads him to believe the prime minister ”is not willing to show his true colours” on the subject.

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OTTAWA (CP) - The federal government has quietly handed senior government officials and the heads of Crown corporations pay raises and increased bonuses, sounding alarm bells from a tax watchdog and the biggest public service union.

Government executives and deputy ministers, the highest ranking public servants, are in line to get a 2.5-per-cent pay raise.

The chief executives of Crown corporations, such as the CBC and Canada Post, are slated to get three-per-cent raises.

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TORONTO – The Harper government’s first federal budget provides more questions than answers about its impact on services to Canadians, according to the Public Service Alliance of Canada.

In its pre-budget submission, PSAC had argued that demands for public services are growing as the population ages and as more and more people locate to larger cities and communities. The union urged the government to reconsider premature tax cuts.

“In addition to tax cuts, particularly the many corporate tax cuts contained in the budget, the Conservatives are slowing government spending at a time when the economy is growing,” says PSAC National President Nycole Turmel. “They’re also instituting another round of expenditure review, cutting $1-billion in each of the next two fiscal years.”

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Eliminating separate assistance program reduces Ottawa’s payment to most needy

OTTAWA — Low- and middle-income families will realize the smallest net benefit from the Harper government’s $1,200-a-year child-care payment in part because the Conservatives are scrapping a separate assistance program.

The Conservative plan for meeting the country’s child-care needs is to give families a direct payment of $100 a month, $1,200 annually, for every child under 6. The specifics of how that plan will be unveiled are expected to be in next Tuesday’s budget.

But the young-child supplement of the Canada Child Tax Benefit, which currently pays $20.25 a month to parents who do not claim child-care expenses for their preschool-age children, will be eliminated at the same time. The benefit is due to increase in July to $249 annually.

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The prime minister avoided the issue in his April 4 Speech from the Throne (meant to outline the government’s agenda for the upcoming session), so Canadians for Equal Marriage held a press conference the following morning. In the media theatre on Parliament Hill, Emily Turk and Cynthia Misener, a lesbian couple hoping to marry later this year, called on Harper to reveal his intentions.

“Nobody should have to plan their wedding under this kind of threat,” they said.

Within two hours, Justice Minister Vic Toews responded by confirming the government’s plan to hold a vote on re-opening the equal marriage debate “sooner rather than later”. Harper himself said a vote would take place “within the life of this Parliament, probably in the fall.”

So, once again, the equality of gay, lesbian, bisexual and trans-identified people is threatened, and the right of all Canadian couples to access civil marriage is hanging in the balance.

Read more at equal-marriage.ca.

The fight continues for a national child care program. As outlined in the Throne Speech on Tuesday, the Harper government is moving forward on financial support for families and ignoring the need for quality child care options.

Here are two press releases issued by the Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada and a backgrounder on the Conservative’s Community Child Care Investment Program.

• Click for Throne Speech - New government must tackle stable funding for child care press release issued on April 3, 2006.
• Click for Child care to become focus of Parliamentary struggle: Throne Speech shows no compromise press release issued April 4, 2006.
• Here is the backgrounder on the Conservative’s Community Child Care Investment Program.

OTTAWA - The Conservatives may talk about transparency but the Speech from the Throne was far from clear on the details of the government’s plans for the upcoming session of Parliament according to the Public Service Alliance of Canada.

“The Speech was long on rhetoric but short on specifics,” says PSAC National President Nycole Turmel. “PSAC members will be waiting for the real news when the government tables its Accountability Act and its first budget.”

According to Turmel, “the Conservatives are promising ‘real protection for whistleblowers’, but we have yet to see just what that means. Real protection for our members means a guarantee of no reprisals and real penalties levied against anyone who breaks that guarantee.”

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Stephen Harper has issued a wake-up call to Canadians. He has made clear his government will table a motion to reopen the divisive debate on equal marriage. In his own words, this will happen “sooner rather than later” after Parliament resumes sitting on April 3.

When Mr. Harper became Prime Minister, our opponents went into high gear. When he appointed Vic Toews as Justice Minister, they cheered even more.

Vote Marriage Canada (formerly Defend Marriage Canada) gave ex-MP Pat O’Brien a new permanent job as its Executive Director. A few weeks later, Focus on the Family, the Canadian branch of a powerful American religious right organization, opened an office in Ottawa under the banner of the Institute for Marriage and Family Canada. IMFC is specifically focused on convincing MPs to support their “family values” agenda, starting with turning back the clock on equal marriage.

These are just two examples of how opponents of equal marriage, backed by their powerful American friends, are preparing to unleash a multi-million dollar campaign to take away those precious rights we fought so hard to establish.

With a vote looming and our opponents mobilizing we have no choice but to act. We can’t afford to stand idly by while millions of dollars are mobilized against us. We can’t afford not to answer this wake-up call as a vote in Parliament looms.Read more at equal-marriage.ca