INAC's employment numbers questioned

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The Department of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) committed itself in 1996 to achieving a 50 per cent Aboriginal employment rate and, as recently as this year, gave its own efforts on meeting that goal a passing grade. But a report compiled by an Aboriginal INAC employee questions the department's methods of collecting the data that produces the employment rate.

That employee is a member of the Committee for the Advancement of Native Employees (CANE). The report suggests the department is aware the methods it uses are questionable, but continues their use because they produce results the department can live with.

CANE's mandate is to work for the recruitment, retention, advancement and improved quality of employment for the Aboriginal employees of INAC. Its report looked at INAC's Aboriginal Employment Statistics (AES) and right from the start it is aggressively critical.

"The AES do not properly reflect the true number of Aboriginal employees in the department.

Furthermore, this paper will assert that the entire department of INAC, in particular, human resources, have not implemented the 50 per cent Aboriginal hiring policy issued under the authority of the assistant deputy minister of corporate services, INAC," the report reads.

Noting that the INAC human resources department collects their data using a PeopleSoft software program that has been found wanting by other federal departments, the report's author quoted from a Department of Justice review titled, "PeopleSoft use in the department."

"In general, we found that PeopleSoft is under-used. Many users treat the system as their secondary reference, and as a result, the quality and integrity of PeopleSoft data suffers." That calls all the INAC numbers into question, the CANE member wrote.

The way INAC identifies which employees are Aboriginal, and which aren't, was also singled out for criticism.

The CANE member argues that the department allows employees to self-identify without having a system in place to ensure that those who claim to be Aboriginal actually are.

"INAC created an employee self-identification declaration form. Please note that under Section D on the form, an INAC employee may declare as an Aboriginal person without any proof. This has led to many internal problems that have not been remedied. For example, in a July, 2001 email from the deputy minister's office on self-identification, it states, 'It has been brought to management's attention that non-Aboriginal persons may be declaring themselves as Aboriginal persons in Aboriginal-only staffing opportunities in order to advance their career. This is of great concern to the department.'"

In an attempt to remedy the abuse, CANE worked with INAC officials to develop an Aboriginal Declaration Form (ADF) that requires proof of Aboriginal ancestry. The form is used for positions in the Aboriginal Employment Program (AEP) which offers some positions only to Aboriginal persons in an attempt to work toward the 50 per cent employment goal.

But INAC's human resources branch has "separated the ADF from the self-identification form. CANE requested that human resources replace the ADF form with their self-identification form to ensure proof of Aboriginal ancestry. In doing so, this would eliminate the abuse. However, human resources did not comply."

All this means that the numbers produced by the department are not reliable, the CANE member concluded.

In order for a government department to be able to generate accurate employment equity statistics, the Canadian Human Rights Commission (CHRC), the group responsible for ensuring compliance with the Employment Equity Act, requires that 80 per cent or more of the employees must respond to questionnaires.

"In an email dated April 12, the corporate employment equity advisor at INAC stated, 'All sectors are below the target of 80 per cent rate of return set by CHRC.' Therefore, based on the Employment Equity At, the data collected by INAC is invalid," the CANE report stated.

When legislation was passed leading to the creation of a new territory of Nunavut, provisions were made to ensure that Inuit people would occupy a representative share of the government jobs, both in the federal and territorial public service. Inuit make up 85 per cent of Nunavut's population but the Inuit people working in the government is far below that level.

In a report issued by Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. and the government of Nunavut called

Annaumaniq, it states that in 2002-2003 the government of Canada provided $692 million under Territorial Funding Formula.

"Of the amount paid out to government of Nunavut employees in salaries and benefits, 85 per cent should have been paid to Inuit. In fact, only 42 per cent went into Inuit pockets. After factoring in a similar proportionate loss in federal government employment, Pricewaterhouse Coopers found that this loss amounted to $123 million in 2002-2003," the Annaumaniq report added.

The CANE report author wonders aloud how much money that should be paid to Aboriginal employees of INAC is paid instead to non-Aboriginal people.

Windspeaker attempted a crude estimation. We know from AES statistics that there were 4,060 INAC employees in the department in the 2004-05 fiscal year. The official INAC numbers-which have now been challenged as unreliable-show that 1,113 Aboriginal employees are included in that number. The best INAC can claim is 27 per cent Aboriginal employment.

It's impossible to know how many of those 1,113 people are indeed Aboriginal, but even if all of them are and they occupy a representative share of jobs at all levels of the department, then approximately 1,000 salaries that should be going to Aboriginal people are not. Even at the extremely low average of $50,000 per year (executive level salaries in the federal civil service are often in excess of $200,000), a minimum of $50 million per year is not getting into boriginal people's pockets.

The report's author clearly believes the department is allowing unreliable numbers to be compiled so it can claim to be moving towards its 50 per cent commitment.

"It is impermissible for a federal government department to collect data that is known to be invalid and then publish statistics on Aboriginal employment in the department using the unreliable data.

Furthermore, it allows INAC to make ... statements such as, 'The department has been viewed as the leader among federal government departments in Aboriginal employment initiatives, having established itself with central agencies as an employer with special needs concerning the recruitment, advancement and retention of Aboriginal people.' This statement is completely untrue," the CANE member wrote.

Staffing at INAC headquarters is especially low in Aboriginal content, the CANE member wrote.

"Of the total 313 positions available at INAC headquarters in that last four years, six positions were filled with Aboriginal people. In accordance with the 50 per cent Aboriginal hiring policy, 156 positions should have been filled with Aboriginal people. There seems to be a disconnect between INAC and politicians with the upcoming First Minister Meeting and discussions around 'closing the gap' between the Aboriginal population and the rest of Canadians," the author wrote.