PS harassment high: study
Experts link persistent levels to mental-health concerns and to half of workforce disability claims
Canada’s public servants report high and persistent levels of harassment on the job that some experts say can be tied to mental health concerns, which account for nearly half of the workforce’s disability claims.
The triennial public service em- ployee survey has consistently found that nearly 30 per cent of public servants say they have faced some kind of harassment over the past two years.
The last survey, in 2011, found they felt harassed by — ranked in order — superiors, co-workers, the public, people working for them or people in other departments.
The survey hadn’t distinguished among types of harassment until this year when — at the urging of MPs on the Status of Women committee — the government added a specific question about sexual harassment. The 2014 survey wrapped up in October with a 69-per-cent response rate, but the results won’t be available for months.
The Status of Women committee’s own report on sexual harassment in the federal workplace, made public in February, garnered little attention until recently, when two Liberal MPs were suspended after being accused of harassing two NDP MPs.
Sir Cary Cooper, an international expert on workplace harassment and professor at the Lancaster University Management School, said the finding that 30 per cent of employees feel they have been harassed is “very high” and should be a red flag for the government about its culture.
He said the reported harassment levels, coupled with the fact that mental health issues (led by depression and anxiety) account for nearly half of all disability claims, “should be a signal to government that they have to do something about it.”
“Those numbers are too high, even for the naysayers who could say people are lazy and say they are harassed or bullied to get off work. But the numbers are too high to ignore. … If the government wants an efficient civil service, they will have to get at it.”
Cooper said persistent harassment leads to absenteeism, more sick leave and mental health problems, and with that come physical ailments, such as heart disease.
He said studies show that all workers suffer when exposed to harassment and bullying. Employees who witness the harassment of colleagues are half as likely as the victims to develop mental health problems, he said.
Treasury Board President Tony Clement is bent on cracking down on absenteeism and improve “wellness” and is trying to do it with an aggressive overhaul of the public service sick-leave regime, replacing it with a new short-term disability plan.
Treasury Board officials told the committee during its hearings into workplace harassment earlier this year that the survey results were “disappointing” and worrisome because those levels have persisted for a few years. In the 2002 and 2005 surveys, the percentage of employees who reported they were harassed hovered at 21 compared with the 30 per cent in 2011.
Ross MacLeod, then assistant deputy minister at Treasury Board, said the government is committed to a healthy and “respectful workplace” and acknowledged that, if left unchecked, harassment has “adverse effects on the mental health and engagement of employees and on the quality of their work.”
The number of formal complaints, however, is small. MacLeod said he was puzzled about why people don’t come forward with complaints and noted that in a separate survey question, about 40 per cent said they would be reluctant to initiate a formal complaint.
“That’s something we need to drill down on a little more the next time around, because I’m worried that if the processes are there to help people and they’re not using them, then it’s hard to get at it.”
Treasury Board has revised its harassment policy three times since 1982 and introduced its latest policy in 2012 aimed at giving deputy ministers the “flexibility” they need to deal with harassment unique to their workplace. The focus is prevention and “informally” resolving complaints.
“Culture is the key. We think that culture underlies respect for people. Lack of respect underlies harassment. If you change the culture and create a respectful work environment, then we’ll see change. That’s very much the theme we’re pursuing in dealing with departments on this issue,” MacLeod said.
The reporting of harassment is influenced by many factors: occupation, nature of work, gender, race, age, tenure and even the wording of the question. The kind of harassment policy analysts might confront is different from that faced by call-centre employees dealing with frazzled Canadians, or prison guards with inmates.
The 2011 survey found female, visible minority, aboriginal and disabled employees are more likely to feel harassed. Half of the disabled respondents reported harassment compared with 42 per cent of aboriginals, 31 per cent of women and 31 per cent of visible minorities.