John tory's flawed plan
National Post
Published: Saturday, March 03, 2007
Lured by the possibility of winning more rural votes in this fall's Ontario provincial election, and motivated by a conservative desire to shift government closer to the people, Ontario Conservative leader John Tory has proposed moving 10% of provincial government jobs out of the capital, Toronto, to the province's smaller cities and towns. While this might sound like a noble idea on the surface, it generally makes for bad policy. Where it has been tried before -- in Ottawa and by other provinces -- this type of decentralization has tended to increase bureaucratic delays and raise the cost of government for taxpayers.
Speaking before a conference sponsored by the Rural Ontario Municipalities Association and the Ontario Good Roads Association, Mr. Tory explained, "If we want to bring Ontarians closer to their government, we must not be afraid to bring government closer to Ontarians in very real, tangible and measurable ways." He then suggested moving upwards of 5,000 Ontario civil servants to places such as Thunder Bay, Kenora and Smiths Falls. This would boost those localities' economies, he speculated, without harming Toronto's.
On that point, he may well be correct. Bringing in high-paying civil service jobs to a city of 60,000 or a town of 6,000 would undoubtedly boost local housing prices, spark new restaurant openings and drive up office rents. It has no doubt helped Summerside, P.E.I., to have a major Revenue Canada office move there; or Regina to acquire the Farm Credit Canada head office.
But do such moves really help decentralize government and move it closer to the governed?
Probably not, because politicians and senior civil servants do not devolve decision-making to the new offices along with the personnel.
What generally ends up happening is that jobs and people are moved, but real authority remains at the centre. Government services become slower, the ranks of the civil service grow and taxpayers find the cost of government rising. Time and money is wasted as the senior people in the new remote office travel back and forth (sometimes several times a month) to the capital to meet with their ministers and deputy ministers to obtain decisions and approvals that they previously only had to walk across the hall for.
Senior bureaucrats also hate being moved from cities where they can get a half-sweet, no whip, decaf, soy milk macchiato on any corner to places where the best they can hope for is an extra large drive-thru double-double. They will do everything to make decentralization fail. Most won't move voluntarily, and it is too difficult to lay them off, so additional bureaucrats have to be hired in the new locations to perform the same jobs.
During the Mulroney government's decentralization drive in the mid- to late-1980s, the federal civil service grew an estimated 3% as a direct result of moves such the National Energy Board relocating to Calgary and the national space agency going to St. Hubert, Que. Contrary to decentralization's theoretical goals, too, most of the increase was in Ottawa, not the regions. In 1980, there were approximately 70,000 civil servants in Ottawa, or about 27% of the national total. By the end of six years of Tory decentralization efforts in 1990, that number had risen to 78,000.
We don't see in Mr. Tory's present plan any indication that he is prepared to give up real power at Queen's Park to new regional offices for municipal planning or welfare or education, and that is the key to making decentralization work. Otherwise, Mr. Tory would merely end up grafting whole new branches of bureaucracy on to Ontario's large public service.
© National Post 2007
National Post
Published: Saturday, March 03, 2007
Lured by the possibility of winning more rural votes in this fall's Ontario provincial election, and motivated by a conservative desire to shift government closer to the people, Ontario Conservative leader John Tory has proposed moving 10% of provincial government jobs out of the capital, Toronto, to the province's smaller cities and towns. While this might sound like a noble idea on the surface, it generally makes for bad policy. Where it has been tried before -- in Ottawa and by other provinces -- this type of decentralization has tended to increase bureaucratic delays and raise the cost of government for taxpayers.
Speaking before a conference sponsored by the Rural Ontario Municipalities Association and the Ontario Good Roads Association, Mr. Tory explained, "If we want to bring Ontarians closer to their government, we must not be afraid to bring government closer to Ontarians in very real, tangible and measurable ways." He then suggested moving upwards of 5,000 Ontario civil servants to places such as Thunder Bay, Kenora and Smiths Falls. This would boost those localities' economies, he speculated, without harming Toronto's.
On that point, he may well be correct. Bringing in high-paying civil service jobs to a city of 60,000 or a town of 6,000 would undoubtedly boost local housing prices, spark new restaurant openings and drive up office rents. It has no doubt helped Summerside, P.E.I., to have a major Revenue Canada office move there; or Regina to acquire the Farm Credit Canada head office.
But do such moves really help decentralize government and move it closer to the governed?
Probably not, because politicians and senior civil servants do not devolve decision-making to the new offices along with the personnel.
What generally ends up happening is that jobs and people are moved, but real authority remains at the centre. Government services become slower, the ranks of the civil service grow and taxpayers find the cost of government rising. Time and money is wasted as the senior people in the new remote office travel back and forth (sometimes several times a month) to the capital to meet with their ministers and deputy ministers to obtain decisions and approvals that they previously only had to walk across the hall for.
Senior bureaucrats also hate being moved from cities where they can get a half-sweet, no whip, decaf, soy milk macchiato on any corner to places where the best they can hope for is an extra large drive-thru double-double. They will do everything to make decentralization fail. Most won't move voluntarily, and it is too difficult to lay them off, so additional bureaucrats have to be hired in the new locations to perform the same jobs.
During the Mulroney government's decentralization drive in the mid- to late-1980s, the federal civil service grew an estimated 3% as a direct result of moves such the National Energy Board relocating to Calgary and the national space agency going to St. Hubert, Que. Contrary to decentralization's theoretical goals, too, most of the increase was in Ottawa, not the regions. In 1980, there were approximately 70,000 civil servants in Ottawa, or about 27% of the national total. By the end of six years of Tory decentralization efforts in 1990, that number had risen to 78,000.
We don't see in Mr. Tory's present plan any indication that he is prepared to give up real power at Queen's Park to new regional offices for municipal planning or welfare or education, and that is the key to making decentralization work. Otherwise, Mr. Tory would merely end up grafting whole new branches of bureaucracy on to Ontario's large public service.
© National Post 2007