Fiscal responsibility means investing in expertise

Wrong to suggest Quebec government workers overpaid, David Bernans says.

Despite the numerous failings of the Couillard Liberal government, the Fraser Institute’s Charles Lammam lauds Quebec for its fiscal responsibility (“Finances, fairness and public-sector pay,” Opinion, March 9).

The sacrifices made by cutting public services, health care and education have allowed the government to present a budgetary surplus and tax cuts for the wealthy, results that are celebrated by the right-wing Fraser Institute. Not only that, Lammam urges the Liberals to take their austerity agenda even further by looking “for potential savings” in the compensation of supposedly overpaid Quebec government employees.

However, to argue that Quebec government employees are overpaid, the Fraser Institute lumps together federal, municipal and provincial employees in the province. These public employees receive wages that are 9.1 per cent higher than their private sector counterparts, according to the Fraser Institute study.

Data from the Institut de la statistique du Québec (ISQ) tell a different story. In reality, Quebec government employees make 9.3 per cent less than employees from all other sectors. Moreover, the total compensation of Quebec government employees is 18.7 per cent less than municipal workers and 41.5 per cent less than federal employees.

Quebec government employees have been living under an austerity regime for decades, not years. Working conditions, often set by government decree rather than by collective agreement, have deteriorated since the 1970s, with wage increases consistently below inflation, meaning losses in purchasing power. As well, since the 1990s, there has been a move away from reliance on in-house expertise; this move has opened the door to corruption. The Charbonneau commission gave us a glimpse into the scope of the problem by revealing how a lack of internal expertise led the Ministère des Transports (MTQ) to hire private firms to oversee the construction work of other private firms. When you put the fox in charge of guarding the henhouse, you are asking for trouble. The Couillard government says it wants to implement the Charbonneau commission’s recommendation to develop public in-house expertise to avoid over-reliance on external private suppliers.

Similar problems exist in the information technology sector, which is why groups are calling for a Charbonneau-style inquiry into the IT industry. Cutting public service jobs is part of the austerity agenda, but it doesn’t save the government any money at the end of the day.

In other words, cutting the government payroll may look fiscally responsible, but it actually increases outsourcing costs and increases the risk of corruption. Investing in expertise is essential to stop the bleeding.

In fact, the Quebec government needs to hire more experts to meet its promise to implement the Charbonneau commission’s recommendation to develop in-house expertise. How can the government meet this objective without increasing the remuneration of its professionals? To attract and retain expertise, the government needs to make the total compensation of its experts competitive with municipal, federal and private sector employees.

The Liberal government seems to be belatedly opening its eyes to the harm done by its draconian cuts to public education. Finance Minister Carlos Leitão appears likely to announce a “reinvestment” in education in his next budget to repair some of the worst damage to Quebec’s at-risk youth and to the economy. Investing in education is the right thing to do, both in human terms and in fiscal terms. The same goes for investing in expertise in Quebec’s public service.

It is the job of Quebec government professionals to ensure the quality of your water, your air and your roads. The health of Quebec’s public finances also depends on the expertise of government professionals. Pay cuts for Quebec government employees would be the opposite of fiscal responsibility. Investing in expertise is the only fiscally responsible course of action.