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The conclusions of the June report released by the Office of the Taxpayers’ Ombudsperson surprised nobody who has had to deal with the Canada Revenue Agency in the last 10 years. Wait times for calls average over 3.5 hours and it can take weeks before an inquiry gets an answer. This problem was reported in an auditor general’s report in 2017 and, to add insult to injury, it was found that even if a person manages to get through to an agent, they are given incorrect information 30 percent of the time.
In 2021, the Taxpayer’s Ombudsperson recommended the CRA begin allowing call scheduling so people needn’t spend hours on hold. The recommendation was ignored. Now things are coming to a head, and the obstinacy on the part of the CRA and the union representing its workers may backfire on them as the Carney government seeks avenues for savings.
The Liberal government announced it will be releasing a budget focused on austerity and investment. Recent announcements of expenditures on job-retraining programs and biofuel production have represented the investment half of the plan, but we haven’t heard of any austerity measures yet. The civil service grew by an unprecedented 43 percent during Justin Trudeau’s nine years in office. Canada’s oversized bureaucracy must be trimmed down if the government wants to get spending under control. Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne has said the government will make “adjustments” to the federal payroll numbers this fall. That can only mean cuts. The only questions are which departments and by how much.
Governments are usually loath to go to battle with civil servants and the unions representing them, but there are few options left if austerity is a goal. The performance of the CRA and the attitude of its union have made the department a prime target for cuts.
Champagne has directed the CRA to implement a 100-day action plan to deal with the call centre delays. The CRA has a history of ignoring directives, however, and it’s unlikely it will make substantial changes to its practices within 100 days. The union is claiming that the CRA needs more employees if it is to improve services. This claim is not reasonable, and it’s only making the public even less sympathetic to the department.
For perspective, the CRA’s American counterpart is the Internal Revenue Service. The IRS has just over 90,500 full-time employees to provide services to a population of 340 million people. Canada’s CRA has 52,500 employees providing services to 41.5 million people. If Canada’s revenue department worked on the same scale as the American one, it would operate with just over 11,300 full-time employees. To be fair, there are fewer federal taxes to be dealt with south of the border, but it’s clear that Canada’s agency is overstaffed.
At the same time, the employees just got substantial raises after going on strike in spring, 2023. The CRA has been one of the departments fighting most strenuously against having employees return to the office for three days per week. Considering the service and efficiency issues, it’s hard to believe Canadians are getting the most from civil servants when they work from a home environment. If CRA workers threaten strike action in response to potential staffing cuts, they won’t have much public support. These negotiations come down to public support, and the government will feel emboldened.
In the age of artificial intelligence and centralized data, there is no excuse for an agency as large as the CRA to be providing such slow and inaccurate responses to citizens. Large bureaucracies don’t change easily, and incremental efforts often fail. If the government makes it clear that it’s serious about expecting cuts, ambitious bureaucrats within the CRA will suddenly find efficiencies—if only for the preservation of their own jobs. Many workers will suddenly find it in themselves to return to the office for more than three days per week again too.
The CRA is the low-hanging fruit among the civil service as far as targeting for cuts goes. It has a massive budget, limited public support, and has been underperforming. The federal government must seek cuts in every department if spending is to be reined in. They will begin with the easier departments to focus on, and the CRA has painted a big target upon its back.
The government’s approach to the CRA in the next six months will be the bellwether for other departments within the civil service. If Champagne is successful in bringing the CRA to heel, other departments will rush to follow suit.
If the government doesn’t hold its ground and trim the CRA’s numbers, its demands for efficiency in other government bureaucracies will fail. Dealing with the CRA offers the acid test for the government’s will in getting federal spending under control.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
