Doesn't A Phoenix Rise From The Ashes, Not Create Them?

The View Up Here

It was 2008 when the Harper government sought to apply "efficiency" to the Federal system of employee payroll management and delivery. Scenarios of tens of millions of dollars saved annually, proof of eliminating "waste" in processes and the resulting PR benefits were all it took for the neoliberal ideologues to buy in. Of course all the while not mentioning the systemic building of a shadow civil service, a core CPC goal. The objective was pursued while collective bargaining agreements were allowed to expire with no intent to reach new agreements or even negotiate with federal unions. All under the guise of CPC "efficiency". Everything was poured into transformation of how the Feds pay their employees. Not how it would actually work and be supported. Over the decades more than 80,000 rules dictating pay to more than 300,000 employees have made their way into the existing processes. The CPC response was to eliminate as many people who knew this system from it as possible, touting redundancy as the reason. This has always been a two part strategy - payroll management and delivery. The CPC is responsible for the management side of the disaster in near totality. But despite having no alternative thanks to the CPC destroying every backup of every pay system in current use, it is the Trudeau LPC government that must own the delivery side of this epic mess. Auditor-General Michael Ferguson has released a scathing report on those failures. It is the fullest picture yet on what was advertised to save $70 million a year but will cost over $1 billion to be functionally useful. Systemic shortcomings and lack of controls paint a picture of a completely ill-advised and ill-equipped implementation that can't be abandoned. Spring 2018 will yield the Auditor-Genearl's report on the CPC failures. Tonight we examine the LPC failures since going on-line with Phoenix which are many.