Ottawa

Not in service

Two weeks ago, the NDP spent a considerable amount of QP haranguing the government side about problems at Service Canada. The Globe has now spent a few days detailing further troubles—government cuts, computer troubles and a complaints office that you can’t complain to. One assumes this will land back on Human Resources Minister Diane Finley’s desk at QP on Monday.

“The unemployment rate hasn’t dropped and the number of claims that has come in over the past couple of months has actually gone up,” Ms. Crowder said. And “they’ve started to reduce the [temporary] staff even as the claim load hasn’t reduced to the extent that they thought it would.” … The department has assured politicians that benefits to the unemployed will not be affected by the funding review, Ms. Crowder said. But the resources that are used to process those payments could be vulnerable. “So HRSDC needs to come clean on exactly how they are going to meet their obligations with regard to cuts,” she said, “and they haven’t done that yet.”

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