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Downloadable versions
1. A Framework for Employment Equity
2. Goals
3. Key Principles
4. A Core Value and an Asset in the Public Service
5. Environmental Context
6. Current Situation of the Designated Groups
7. Employment Equity Legislation
8. Achieving the Vision: Strategic Actions
1. A Framework for Employment Equity
This strategic framework is the employer's vision of employment equity in the
federal Public Service over the next five years. It positions employment equity as a
fundamental component of Public Service renewal and highlights its contribution to getting
government right by providing quality service to Canadians of various backgrounds. Under
the Employment Equity Act, there are four designated groups: Aboriginal peoples; persons
with disabilities; persons in a visible minority group; and women.
2. Goals
The principal goals of employment equity in the Public Service are:
- establishing a workforce of qualified employees that reflects the diversity of Canadian
society; and
- ensuring equal access to job opportunities by eliminating employment barriers and
correcting the conditions that have historically impeded the equitable participation and
distribution of persons in the designated groups.
3. Key Principles
- Fairness: to ensure that no person is denied career opportunities for reasons unrelated
to ability.
- Inclusion: to open doors to and retain the best and brightest employees drawn from
diverse backgrounds.
- Cohesion: to encourage the pursuit of individual career objectives while employees
contribute to organizational goals that are guided by a shared set of Public Service
values and ethics.
- Relevance : to strive for a representative Public Service that understands the needs of
a diverse public and serves Canada and Canadians well by providing effective policy and
quality front-line services.
The federal Public Service must:
- provide excellent service to Canada and Canadians;
- be a vibrant, national and representative institution that is capable of adapting to
change;
- be a milieu in which the best and brightest are inspired to pursue a career and make a
significant contribution to the prosperity of the nation.
A Public Service that increasingly and consistently integrates the principles of
fairness, inclusion, cohesion and relevance into its culture will attract and nurture the
required skills and talents. These principles complement the concept of merit by ensuring
that persons best qualified for employment in the Public Service are drawn from a pool
that reflects the diversity of Canadian society. Every qualified Canadian should have an
opportunity to be in that pool.
This vision recognises numerical performance as an important indicator of progress in
correcting conditions that hinder the full and equitable participation of designated group
members in the Public Service. It also recognises that success in reaching numerical goals
for hiring, promotion and retention requires significant attitudinal change and this may
constitute our single greatest challenge.
4. A Core Value and an Asset to the Public Service
Employment equity is integral to good Public Service management and to the delivery of
quality services to the public. Reflecting the diversity of the Canadian population
relates directly to the Public Service mandate of a non-partisan, professional,
service-oriented institution. A representative Public Service belongs to all Canadians and
will be in a better position to understand and serve their collective interests well.
Employment equity is particularly relevant in rejuvenating the Public Service. Indeed,
it is good business. Canada needs a Public Service that is dynamic and productive and
whose employees are inspired to provide quality service to the public. A qualified,
competent public sector drawn from diverse backgrounds and offering different perspectives
has greater potential for responsiveness, flexibility, creativity and getting government
right by balancing new ideas with the wisdom of experience. Such a public sector fosters
innovative approaches to solving problems, delivering programs and providing more
comprehensive advice to decision makers.
5. Environmental
Context
Several factors have significantly changed the role of government in Canada and how its
policies are determined and perceived. These include:
- matters of national unity;
- the evolving demographics of increased ethnic and cultural diversity;
- expectations of an increasingly heterogeneous population;
- higher labour market participation of women;
- new information technologies enabling Canadians to have better access to each other and
to their government;
Such matters have combined with program review and downsizing initiatives to reinforce
the complex nature of governance as the twenty-first century approaches.
Public Service renewal offers both opportunity and challenge in dealing with this
complexity. Over the next decade, 70% of the executive category, 45% of the executive
feeder group, and 35% of the scientific and professional category will be in a position to
retire. The challenge will be to find and develop the combination of skills to maintain
quality in Public Service functions. At the same time as the size of the Public Service is
shrinking, the Canadian labour market is witnessing an increase in the number and
proportion of persons from the employment equity designated groups.
Against this backdrop, the federal government is committed to improving the quality of
its programs and services, to make them more relevant, effective, efficient, affordable,
accessible and fair. In responding to the challenges and in striving to better serve the
national interest, the Public Service is also faced with increased demands from the
society at large for accountability and results.
Strategies that are vital to the development of appropriate responses include:
- identifying and adopting alternative means to deliver services efficiently;
- being more responsive and flexible in program delivery;
- broadening the perspectives involved in policy and decision making in government;
- ensuring that government operations are more results-based, with a focus on quality
service to clients;
- being more proactive and making better use of information technology to get government
closer to Canadians;
- providing leadership in helping the population, understand, respect and value
differences and diverse viewpoints.
Adopting and integrating employment equity as a core value and viewing it as an asset
in the federal Public Service will help in establishing a high calibre, representative
workforce to implement these strategies.
6. Current Situation of the Designated Groups
Over the past decade, there has been progress in increasing the representation
of all designated groups. Currently, as at March 31, 1999, these levels are: Aboriginal
peoples (2.9%); persons in a visible minority group (5.9%); persons with disabilities
(4.6%); and women (51.5%). The representation of minority designated groups continues to
lag behind their availability in the Canadian labour market (1.7%) for Aboriginal peoples;
(8.7%) for visible minorities; and (4.8%) for persons with disabilities. Although the
overall representation of women is now slightly higher than their labour market
availability (48.7%), there is uneven distribution by occupational category.
7. Employment Equity Legislation
The Employment Equity Act and Regulations, in force since October 24, 1996, reinforce
the government's commitment to employment equity and now cover the federal public
sector as well as the federally regulated private sector.
Implementation of the Employment Equity Act (1995) requires departments and agencies of
the Public Service to assume greater responsibility and to be more accountable for
employment equity. They must report on their plans, performance and progress. The
President of the Treasury Board must table in Parliament an annual report on the
employment equity situation in the federal Public Service. The precedents of human rights
litigation and Tribunal decisions, plus the increased vigilance of community groups,
encourage greater transparency, accountability and increased public scrutiny of employment
equity responsibilities in the Public Service.
The Employment Equity Act also gives the Canadian Human Rights Commission an explicit
responsibility for ensuring compliance. Starting in October 1997, the Commission will
audit departments and agencies to determine whether they comply with the Act. Where
non-compliance is determined, the Commission will seek a written undertaking that specific
measures will be taken to remedy the non-compliance.
8. Achieving the Vision: Strategic Actions
Several players have roles and share responsibilities in realising our vision of
employment equity in the Public Service over the next five years. To facilitate progress
in delivering on elements of this vision, the Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) has
prepared a document entitled Shared Responsibilities for Implementing the New Employment
Equity Legislation. It describes roles and responsibilities of the TBS, the Public Service
Commission and departments and agencies for which the Treasury Board is the employer. TBS
and departments will continue to consult and collaborate with bargaining agents in
implementing the legislation. Finally, TBS and departments will continue to develop
mechanisms for ensuring that all employees subscribe to this vision - not just persons in
the designated groups.
The establishment of a more representative, relevant and responsive Public Service will
be achieved only through actions that position employment equity as an integral part of a
department's business and its corporate strategy. This vision will not be realized if
employment equity is treated solely as an add-on, a tangential human resources issue, or
as an isolated program.
The following are some key areas where attention must be focused. Strategic
orientations may vary by particular departmental circumstances, including designated group
representation therein.
Culture Change
To ensure the success of employment equity, it is necessary:
- to cultivate positive attitudes, bias-free behaviours, and positive relationships among
managers and employees in organizations of the Public Service;
- to solidify trust and respect in the workplace and to develop a work environment that
demonstrates a clear commitment to diversity;
- to foster an appreciation of the contributions that can be and are being made in the
Canadian labour market, in general, and the Public Service of Canada, in particular, by
persons from diverse backgrounds.
Senior Management
Commitment and Leadership
This means:
- 'walking the talk' to make employment equity an important organizational
priority, clearly linked to corporate values and goals;
- demonstrating top-down commitment by drawing employment equity "champions"
from the senior ranks of departments;
- using the Public Service-wide La Relève initiative as a lever for advancing employment
equity in departments departments.
Accountability
It is important for:
- senior managers to be accountable for overall performance and progress with respect to
employment equity within their organizations;
- line managers and supervisors at all levels and in all regions of the country to be
accountable for ensuring that employment equity is implemented within departmental
operations;
- accountability to be established by integrating employment equity into managers'
accountability statements and linking employment equity to operational goals.
Linkages to Operational and Human Resource Plans
It is also necessary to:
- factor employment equity into departmental business plans, La Relève plans and
operational/organizational goals;
- include employment equity considerations in succession planning and all human resources
planning and initiatives;
- ensure that regional perspectives are reflected in developing employment equity plans
and implementation mechanisms.
Communications and Education
It is crucial to:
- promote awareness and understanding of the rationale and objectives of employment
equity;
- encourage and support training and development, including skills for managing diversity,
in regions and at headquarters.
Partnerships and Continued Support of Innovation.
It is essential to:
- sustain co-operation through joint programs (e.g. among departments, and between
departments and non- governmental organizations);
- share best practices and the exchange of ideas as means of encouraging innovative
approaches to implementing employment equity;
- establish bilateral and multi-partite partnerships among members of the designated
groups, advisory committees, regional councils, unions, and federal departments and
agencies. Partnerships should also extend to other levels of government and the private
sector, since such cross-fertilisation may bring different perspectives and new approaches
to the issues.
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