Phoenix "disaster" because of the government's culture of avoiding liability: Senate

The wage "fiasco" affecting federal government employees was largely Part result of a According to a Senate study on Phoenix's compensation system, the bureaucratic culture of liability avoidance that will require tighter political control before launching such complex projects at the same time. 39; future.

The system was put online more than two years ago. The more than 300,000 government workers and taxpayers saving $ 70 million a year have costed nearly $ 1 billion in unplanned expenses.

The Total Cost Could Reach $ 2.2 Billion 023, Says a Report of the Senate National Finance Committee

The Report, Released Tuesday, Calls on Parliament to Get More Involved in Monitoring Solutions Phoenix and what the government is developing to replace it. disaster has revealed a cultural problem in managing the federal bureaucracy, a problem that we must solve if the government is to succeed in undertaking complex projects like this in the future, "said the report's co-author and vice-chair of the committee. André Pratte

The report noted that "no one has accepted responsibility for Phoenix's failure or has been held accountable".

But rather than blaming senior officials for the failures of the pay system, the committee blamed largely a "fundamental cultural management problem in the public service" for the Phoenix fiasco.

"The government must move away from a culture that plays," says the report

The Senate committee report comes back to more bad news for the public service that has put a brake on its Phoenix management, including a war of words between the federal Auditor General and the Clerk of the Privy Council.

In May, Michael Ferguson called Phoenix "incomprehensible failure" resulting from an "obedient culture" in the public service. A few weeks later, Clerk of the Privy Council Michael Wernick fired back, accusing Ferguson of "hasty generalizations" about the officials and calling Phoenix "repairable." Since its launch in early 2016, the Phoenix system has been wrong for more than half of the officials. All federal employees working in dozens of government departments and agencies

Problems, including overpayments, underpayments and sometimes no payments, have affected more than others some employees and created a backlog of year. By the end of June, the backlog has been reduced to about 577,000 unresolved cases.

Among its five main recommendations, the committee asked the Trudeau government to set targets for the processing of outstanding pay claims.

He also urged the government to do more to help employees in financial difficulty.

For employees affected by Phoenix, and their unions, the Senate report was not a surprise.

Workers criticized Tuesday's results for not having reprimanded individuals for their role in launching the system despite the fact that Phoenix had not been tested properly.

Pratte defended the committee's decision not to call bureaucrats to testify to their role in Phoenix. arguing that the failures of the system go beyond a handful of people.

"If we had these three people before the committee, that would have meant they were the only ones responsible for the problem, and that is not the case," he said.

"He This is obviously a much larger problem than three individuals. "

Unions representing federal workers have asked the government to pay damages for emotional and mental stress caused by Phoenix. Earlier this year, the compensation talks quickly became bogged down when government negotiators declared that they did not have the mandate to proceed.

"The government must accept responsibility, compensate employees and put in place a solid process.

National President of the Public Service Alliance of Canada, said in an email.

The PSAC also asked that a national public inquiry be conducted. take a closer look at what's wrong with Phoenix.