Payday headaches Problems for more than 80,000 civil servants to be resolved by October
OTTAWA The federal government could have done a better job implementing the new payroll system that’s causing serious payday headaches for tens of thousands of civil servants, a senior bureaucrat admitted to a Commons committee Thursday.
But moving from the antiquated, paper-heavy pay system the government used for four decades to the electronic Phoenix system was the right call at the right time, said deputy public services minister Marie Lemay.
“I think we could have done additional measures (to smooth the transition process),” Lemay told the House of Commons committee that oversees government operations. “But the move to the second wave and the move to Phoenix is the right decision.”
MPs on the committee grilled Lemay and other officials with questions, including one civil servants and their unions have been asking for months: why was Phoenix rolled out when it was clear it had significant shortcomings?
There were indications of “bugs” in the Phoenix system after it was first launched on a limited basis in February following several delays and a thirdparty assessment, she said.
But the issues were minor, said Lemay, who took on a new role as deputy minister just as Phoenix was being fully implemented in a much larger second wave. And she would have recommended the system be given the green light at that time, she told the committee.
Still, knowing what she knows now, that second phase should have included more time for employees to be trained on the system and the government should have retained many of the pay system employees that were let go as the new system came online, she said.