Canadian Labour Reporter

pretty damaging results for the government. This should be rais- ing some red flags." The survey is conducted ev- ery three years, led by the Office of the Chief Human Resources Officer (Treasury Board of Can- ada Secretariat) in collaboration with Statistics Canada. Conducted regularly since 1999, it measures employees' opinions regarding engagement, leadership, the workforce and the workplace. The 2014 survey was conducted between Aug. 25 and Oct. 3, 2014. A total of 182,165 employees in 93 federal departments and agencies responded to the survey for a total response rate of 71.4 per cent. Newer questions around harassment, discrimination New questions were added to the 2014 government survey to address harassment and dis- crimination issues raised in pre- vious surveys. About one-fifth (19 per cent) of public service employees said they experienced harassment in the past two years, according to the 2014 results. The most com- mon types of harassment were offensive remarks, unfair treat- ment and being excluded or ig- nored. Of the employees who report- ed being harassed, seven per cent indicated they had filed a griev- ance or formal complaint while 25 per cent reported they had taken no action. Of the employees surveyed in 2014, eight per cent reported ex- periencing discrimination in the past two years. The most common forms of discrimination included sex (24 per cent), age (23 per cent) and race (20 per cent). Of the employees who report- ed being discriminated against, seven per cent indicated they had filed a grievance or formal com- plaint while 48 per cent indicated they had taken no action. Tony Clement, president of the Treasury Board, said the fed- eral government is committed to providing a safe environment for public service employees. "Harassment and discrimina- tion are unacceptable and will not be tolerated," Clement said in a statement. "We have implemented poli- cies, and training, as well as formal and informal recourse mechanisms to ensure that lead- ers and employees have the tools they need to prevent and resolve workplace harassment and dis- crimination. We must continue our efforts in these areas." The 2014 survey's new ques- tions concerning harassment and discrimination will provide the government with a better understanding of these issues and allow for more informed re- sponses in the future, according to the Treasury Board. Benson, however, said unions would have been included in the survey process if the government was serious about improving the workplace for public service employees. She said union input on the content — and even the wording — of survey questions would yield more meaningful data. The results of the 2014 survey, Benson said, clearly show unions are more in touch with the needs of public service workers. "Those responses are indica- tors there are problems in the workplace. While the govern- ment wants to take sick leave we, on the other hand, want to en- sure that when our members go to work, it's to a healthy and safe environment so they can contin- ue to serve Canadians," Benson said. She called the government's efforts to scrap sick leave trou- bling. "It's problematic, what's taking place. For us, I think that's all very indicative of the attitude within the Treasury Board. This is a government where Mr. Clement has been very disrespectful to his employees, our members, and I think it shows through in this survey." Work-life balance on the decline Benson pointed to the survey's results concerning work-life bal- ance and workload as well as re- sults concerning organizational performance. In the 2014 survey, 71 per cent of employees agreed they had ad- equate support for work-life bal- ance, down from 75 per cent in the previous survey. Additionally, 48 per cent of employees surveyed said hav- ing to do the same or more work with fewer resources affected the quality of their work "always/al- most always" or "often." This was an increase from 44 per cent in 2011 and 42 per cent in 2008. Warren "Smokey" Thomas, president of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OP- SEU), said the 2014 Public Ser- vice Employee Survey should act as a wakeup call. "The government has been shrinking the size of the public service but the work didn't go away. So they're just forcing few- er people to do more with less," Thomas said. "And it really has taken a toll on people, and it's starting to show. I would hope what the government takes away from the survey is that all the cuts to pub- lic services are not good. They're not healthy." Additional front-line workers would alleviate the workload, said Thomas, though he did not anticipate a hiring boom anytime soon. Something the govern- ment could easily do, Thomas said, is adjust its attitude toward workers. "You can't cut them, you can't blame them for all the woes in the world and use them like scape- goats," he said. "Labour relations are every bit as complex as the relationship in a marriage. I wish they would learn that from the survey." 7 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015 CANADIAN LABOUR REPORTER news < from pg. 1 Harassment, discrimination highlighted The number of workers who feel adequately supported to provide a high level of service or to have work-life balance is declining, according to the 2014 Public Service Employee Survey. Photo: (Reuters)

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