Other issues—Standing Committee on Public Accounts: Office of the Auditor General Audit on Respect in the Workplace (January 28, 2021)

Concerns raised by the Customs and Immigration Union

The Customs and Immigration Union (CIU), along with other bargaining units representing CBSA employees, are key partners in creating a respectful workplace and provide valuable perspectives from their membership.

We have engaged them on our strategies and plans to address issues, including sharing findings from our Listening Tours and discussing the Agency's overarching Respectful Workplace Framework.

We continue to discuss various elements requiring change to ensure success in creating our desired workplace culture, free of harassment and discrimination.

One area of concern raised by the CIU was that it takes too long to address complaints and the process itself is too long. There are many contributing factors to this issue and their feedback has helped to focus the efforts of the National Integrity Centre of Expertise.

The CIU has also expressed concern with the nature of training. In response, a joint Agency-CIU working group was struck, tasked with identifying and addressing gaps in existing training. The outcome of this work may range from improvements to existing training to the development of net-new learning products.

Following the announcement of the implementation of Bill C-65, the CBSA established a working group with the CIU and two other bargaining agents Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC) and the Canadian Association of Professional Employees (CAPE).Through significant collaborative efforts, the working group jointly developed the CBSA Workplace Harassment and Violence Prevention Policy which came into force on January 1, 2021.

Recruitment and retention

The CBSA is committed to ensuring that the Public Service represents the country it serves.

It has always been a CBSA priority to ensure that we have a strong, diverse and inclusive workforce of CBSA employees, including Border Services Officers (BSO) who are flexible, armed, and job-ready.

The CBSA receives thousands of applications to the CBSA Officer Trainee – Developmental Program, including from approximately 350 Veterans and Indigenous Peoples over the last few years.

Our BSOs play a key role in protecting Canadian society, the environment and industry. Their work is multifaceted, complex and dynamic, and because of this, we have a rigorous Officer Induction Model (OIM) which is comprised of three phases focused on outreach and recruitment, training, and development.

During fiscal year 2019 to 2020, the Officer Induction Development Program (OID Program) issued 238 letters of offer to graduates of the CBSA College, which helped offset the 378 BSO departures seen that same year (84 of these departures were attributed to BSOs retiring (1.58%)).

While 2019 to 2020 saw the highest departure rate of BSOs over the past 7 years (7.09%), this was due to an increase in internal promotions and not departures from the Agency.

The Agency BSO recruitment model follows a two-year calendar model and is tied to an attrition rate which averages out to 5% per year. To date, no adjustment has been required outside of this model. Furthermore, project funding allows for additional resources and other workload management tools, such as the use of overtime, realignment of work, etc.