Departmental Performance Report 2015-16: Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Message from the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer
• Results Highlights
• Section I: Organizational Overview
  • Organizational Profile
  • Organizational Context
  • Organizational Priorities
• Section II: Expenditure Overview
  • Actual Expenditures
  • Budgetary Performance Summary
  • Departmental Spending Trend
  • Expenditures by Vote
  • Alignment of Spending With the Whole-of-Government Framework
  • Financial Statements and Financial Statements Highlights
• Section III: Analysis of Program and Internal Services
  • Program
    • Program Title – Independent review of military grievances
  • Internal Services
• Section IV: Supplementary Information
  • Federal Tax Expenditures
  • Organizational Contact Information
• Appendix: Definitions
• Endnotes

Message from the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer

As the Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer of the Military Grievances External Review Committee (Committee), I am pleased to submit the Committee’s Departmental Performance Report for 2015-2016.

During the period covered by this report, the Committee remained agile and adaptable to achieve positive results against its organizational priorities. In spite of the combined impact of a significant increase in case referrals and vacancies in Committee membership, the Committee was able to successfully adjust its processes and resources in a relatively short span of time without compromising its previous gains in efficiency or the quality of its work. The results presented in this report validate the Committee’s efforts: 73% of cases received during the period covered by the report were completed by the end of that period, both positive feedback from stakeholders and internally-conducted analysis attested, once again, to the high quality and added value of the Committee’s Findings and Recommendations.

As well, in 2015-2016, the Committee continued to communicate the results of its work, mainly through exchanges with members of the military, decision-makers and other stakeholders and publications. These efforts allow us to bring critical and recurring issues to the attention of the Chief of the Defence Staff and the Canadian Armed Forces, and to gather valuable information to increase the Committee’s understanding of the challenges faced by military personnel.

To effectively deliver on its core mandate, the Committee must be able to count on steady and reliable support from its corporate services. Notwithstanding their own challenges, the Corporate Services Branch adapted to increasing demand from the Operations Branch, successfully implemented government-wide initiatives, and ensured alignment with new government business systems and practices.

The Committee’s dedicated employees work hard to achieve results not only to satisfy reporting requirements, but also to set the course for future successes. As I submit this report, I convey my confidence in the Committee’s ability to continue fulfilling its mandate in spite of the challenges it faces, as well as its determination to stay true to its vision – To be a centre of expertise in military grievances and a model administrative tribunal, through fair and efficient processes, professionalism, and good governance.

Bruno Hamel
Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer

Results Highlights

What funds were used?

$6,251,598

Who was involved?

43 employees

Results Highlights

• In 2015-2016, the Committee celebrated its 15^th anniversary and was referred the highest number of cases ever, resulting in it issuing the greatest number of findings and recommendations since its coming into operations
• In support of a lean office – efforts were taken to find new ways to increase effectiveness and reduce costs, as well as to seek innovative internal service delivery solutions
• In support of Blueprint 2020:
  • Increased use of mobile technologies (including desktop virtualization and wi-fi) has enabled the Committee to be agile and to provide a flexible workspace that promotes productive and well-connected collaboration
  • Going “paperless” – by increasing automation and improving information management

Section I: Organizational Overview

Organizational Profile

Appropriate Minister: The Honourable Harjit Singh Sajjan, P.C., M.P.

Institutional Head: Bruno Hamel, Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer

Ministerial Portfolio: National Defence

Enabling Instrument: National Defence Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. N-5^{Endnote i}

Year of Incorporation / Commencement: 2000

Other: About the Committee^{Endnote ii}

Mandate

The Military Grievances External Review Committee is an independent administrative tribunal reporting to Parliament through the Minister of National Defence.

The Military Grievances External Review Committee reviews military grievances referred to it pursuant to section 29 of the National Defence Act and provides findings and recommendations to the Chief of the Defence Staff and the Canadian Armed Forces member who submitted the grievance.

Organizational Context

Raison d’être

The raison d’être of the Military Grievances External Review Committee is to provide an independent and external review of military grievances. Section 29 of the National Defence Act (NDA) provides a statutory right for an officer or a non-commissioned member who has been aggrieved, to grieve a decision, an act or an omission in the administration of the affairs of the Canadian Armed Forces. The importance of this broad right cannot be overstated since it is, with certain narrow exceptions, the only formal complaint process available to Canadian Armed Forces members.

Responsibilities

The Committee reviews military grievances referred to it and provides findings and recommendations (F&Rs) to the Chief of the Defence Staff (CDS) and the officer or non-commissioned member who submitted the grievance.

The Committee also has the obligation to deal with all matters before it as informally and expeditiously as the circumstances and the considerations of fairness permit.

Strategic Outcome and Program Alignment Architecture

1. Strategic Outcome: The Chief of the Defence Staff and members of the Canadian Armed Forces have access to a fair, independent and timely review of military grievances.

1.1 Program: Independent review of military grievances

Internal Services

Operating Environment and Risk Analysis

Under the authority of the NDA, the Chairperson, at least two Vice-Chairpersons, and any other members are appointed by the Governor in Council (GIC). While the Committee has the internal staff resources in place to deal with additional cases, the Committee’s capability to effectively deliver on its mandate hinges upon an adequate complement of members and therefore depends on the GIC appointment process. This has been of particular concern, given that the GIC appointment process has resulted in significant delays in staffing the Committee’s GIC member positions. In light of these delays, the Committee is not able to meet its statutory requirement under the NDA to have at least two Vice-Chairpersons (one full-time and one part-time). Should this situation continue, there is a risk that the Committee will be unable to carry out its responsibilities in an expeditious manner. This, combined with the increased number of grievances being referred to the Committee, places the organization in a precarious situation as it pertains to fulfilling its mandate. Should the Committee fail to perform as expected due to GIC appointment process delays, the repercussions will negatively impact grievors and their families, as well as the CAF.

Although the Committee has been established under the NDA, the risk that its work could be perceived as not adding value to the CAF grievance process remains. To address this risk, the Committee continued to produce quality F&R in a timely manner. In addition, the Committee continued to monitor its internal grievance process, provided key and focused training to employees and Committee members, and communicated the role and results of its work to CAF stakeholders and parliamentarians.

Finally, the capacity to recruit and retain employees presents equal challenges in the area of maintaining the required specialized knowledge base and skill sets, particularly in light of the Committee’s limited ability to offer opportunities for advancement and establish internal feeder groups for career development given its micro size. To mitigate this risk, the Committee has encouraged, supported, and rewarded employee training and development opportunities, recognizing that learning is fundamental to the fulfillment of its mandate. It has also planned for succession in key positions and developed or adopted a variety of staffing mechanisms to ensure a full complement of qualified employees.

Organizational Priorities

Name of Priority – Operational Performance – Ensure optimum productivity and excellence

Description – To ensure high quality and timely Findings and Recommendations (F&Rs) thereby contributing to the fairness and efficiency of the grievance process.

Priority Type^{Footnote 1} – Ongoing

Name of Priority – Communicate the Committee’s role, results and activities

Description – To ensure that stakeholders have a better awareness and understanding of the Committee’s role, results and activities. To share the Committee’s perspective on significant issues arising from our review of grievances.

Priority Type – Ongoing

Name of Priority – Exercise leadership and maintain overall effective management of the Committee

Description – To meet government-wide management and accountability priorities through management excellence and sound internal oversight.

Priority Type – Ongoing

For more information on organizational priorities, see the Minister’s mandate letter.^{Endnote iv}

Section II: Expenditure Overview

Actual Expenditures

Budgetary Performance Summary

Departmental Spending Trend

Over the six fiscal years depicted here, the Committee’s actual and planned spending is consistent.

Expenditures by Vote

For information on the Military Grievances External Review Committee’s organizational voted and statutory expenditures, consult the Public Accounts of Canada 2016.^{Endnote v}

Alignment of Spending With the Whole-of-Government Framework

Financial Statements and Financial Statements Highlights

Financial Statements

Financial Statements Highlights

The Military Grievances External Review Committee’s financial statements^{Endnote vii} can be found on its website.

Section III: Analysis of Program and Internal Services

Program

Program Title – Independent review of military grievances

Description

The Military Grievances External Review Committee, an independent tribunal, reviews military grievances referred to it pursuant to section 29 of the National Defence Act which provides a statutory right for an officer or a non-commissioned member who has been aggrieved, to grieve a decision, an act or an omission in the administration of the affairs of the Canadian Armed Forces; this is, with certain narrow exceptions, the only formal complaint process available to members of the Canadian Armed Forces.

The Committee provides findings and recommendations to the Chief of the Defence Staff and the member who submitted the grievance. The findings and recommendations may also identify issues with policies or other matters of broad concern. The Committee conducts its review as informally and expeditiously as the circumstances and the considerations of fairness permit.

The Committee reports the results of its activities through its annual report and various publications.

Program Performance Analysis and Lessons Learned

The Committee closely monitored its performance and caseload throughout 2015-2016. While the caseload increased significantly, the Committee’s processes remained responsive and the Committee was able to meet its productivity targets and complete the independent review of military grievances, despite the minimal number of Committee members.

Small initiatives such as assigning similar cases to the same grievance team have resulted in greater efficiency in processing the grievances and increased consistency in the approach taken.

The Committee obtained a Twitter account in April 2015 and has since used it to notify stakeholders and target audiences of events such as the publication of the Annual Report, and to re-tweet items of importance.

Internal Services

Description

Internal services are groups of related activities and resources that are administered to support the needs of programs and other corporate obligations of an organization. Internal services include only those activities and resources that apply across an organization, and not those provided to a specific program. The groups of activities are Management and Oversight Services; Communications Services; Legal Services; Human Resources Management Services; Financial Management Services; Information Management Services; Information Technology Services; Real Property Services; Materiel Services; and Acquisition Services.

Program Performance Analysis and Lessons Learned

2015-2016 brought challenges to the Committee’s corporate services, as they were required to keep pace with important government-wide changes in business processes and delivery, while adapting to increasing demands for support from the Independent review of military grievances program. These efforts included finding new ways to increase effectiveness and reduce costs, seeking innovative internal services delivery solutions, while maintaining alignment with new government business systems and practices. In addition, the Committee continued to revise its organizational structure to allow for a reduction of the internal services costs, increased efficiency and flexibility, and improved the internal services cost ratio relative to the costs of the independent review of the military grievances program.

Over the course of the year, the Committee sought, as it always does, opportunities provided by partnerships and technological advances. Network and sharing have provided opportunities in this regard; for example, the Committee implemented a partnership for sharing technical resources with another small organization, with which a new Information Technology Operational Framework and Standard Operating Procedures are shared. In addition, the Committee was an early adopter of cloud computing technology and desktop virtualization to add flexibility and support teleworking. A wireless connection on the premises was made available to all employees and efforts have been made to move quickly towards significantly reducing paper use.

Also in 2015-2016, the Committee implemented the new government-wide human resources system, MyGCHR to increase efficiency, and planned for the adoption of the New Direction in Staffing released by the Public Service Commission in April 2016. In addition, significant preparations have been underway to transition the Committee to the new government-wide pay system, Phoenix, and the government-wide financial system, SAP. The Committee is an active member of the Treasury Board Secretariat Financial Management Transformation team that has been tasked with developing a version of SAP that is appropriate to micro-organizations, and is scheduled to implement the new system in April 2018.

Finally, the Committee undertook to revamp its integrated planning process across the organization. This served as an excellent opportunity to align the Committee’s human resources, financial resources, assets, and information resources with program activities to ensure that the Committee is working in the most efficient manner and is able to fully account for its activities and effectively track project progress. As such, a brand-new approach was adopted, including an annual high-level action plan that links program activities with financial requirements and interdependencies with other subject matter experts (human resources, procurement, information technology, etc.). This new approach also enables the Committee to tell a consistent results story across corporate documents and central agency reports.

Section IV: Supplementary Information

Federal Tax Expenditures

The tax system can be used to achieve public policy objectives through the application of special measures such as low tax rates, exemptions, deductions, deferrals and credits. The Department of Finance Canada publishes cost estimates and projections for these measures annually in the Report of Federal Tax Expenditures.^{Endnote viii} This report also provides detailed background information on tax expenditures, including descriptions, objectives, historical information and references to related federal spending programs. The tax measures presented in this report are the responsibility of the Minister of Finance.

Organizational Contact Information

Military Grievances External Review Committee
60 Queen Street, 10^th Floor
Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5Y7
Canada
Telephone: (613) 996-8529
Secure Telephone: 877-276-4193
Fax: (613) 996-6491
Secure Fax: (613) 995-8129
TDD: 877-986-1666
Email: mgerc-ceegm@mgerc-ceegm.gc.ca
Web: http://www.mgerc-ceegm.gc.ca

Appendix: Definitions

budgetary expenditures (dépenses budgétaires):

Operating and capital expenditures; transfer payments to other levels of government, organizations or individuals; and payments to Crown corporations.

Departmental Performance Report (rapport ministériel sur le rendement):

Reports on an appropriated organization’s actual accomplishments against the plans, priorities and expected results set out in the corresponding Reports on Plans and Priorities. These reports are tabled in Parliament in the fall.

full-time equivalent (équivalent temps plein):

A measure of the extent to which an employee represents a full person-year charge against a departmental budget. Full-time equivalents are calculated as a ratio of assigned hours of work to scheduled hours of work. Scheduled hours of work are set out in collective agreements.

Government of Canada outcomes (résultats du gouvernement du Canada):

A set of 16 high-level objectives defined for the government as a whole, grouped in four spending areas: economic affairs, social affairs, international affairs and government affairs.

Management, Resources and Results Structure (Structure de la gestion, des ressources et des résultats):

A comprehensive framework that consists of an organization’s inventory of programs, resources, results, performance indicators and governance information. Programs and results are depicted in their hierarchical relationship to each other and to the Strategic Outcome(s) to which they contribute. The Management, Resources and Results Structure is developed from the Program Alignment Architecture.

non-budgetary expenditures (dépenses non budgétaires):

Net outlays and receipts related to loans, investments and advances, which change the composition of the financial assets of the Government of Canada.

performance (rendement):

What an organization did with its resources to achieve its results, how well those results compare to what the organization intended to achieve, and how well lessons learned have been identified.

performance indicator (indicateur de rendement):

A qualitative or quantitative means of measuring an output or outcome, with the intention of gauging the performance of an organization, program, policy or initiative respecting expected results.

performance reporting (production de rapports sur le rendement):

The process of communicating evidence-based performance information. Performance reporting supports decision making, accountability and transparency.

planned spending (dépenses prévues):

For Reports on Plans and Priorities (RPPs) and Departmental Performance Reports (DPRs), planned spending refers to those amounts that receive Treasury Board approval by February 1. Therefore, planned spending may include amounts incremental to planned expenditures presented in the Main Estimates.

A department is expected to be aware of the authorities that it has sought and received. The determination of planned spending is a departmental responsibility, and departments must be able to defend the expenditure and accrual numbers presented in their RPPs and DPRs.

plans (plan):

The articulation of strategic choices, which provides information on how an organization intends to achieve its priorities and associated results. Generally a plan will explain the logic behind the strategies chosen and tend to focus on actions that lead up to the expected result.

priorities (priorité):

Plans or projects that an organization has chosen to focus and report on during the planning period. Priorities represent the things that are most important or what must be done first to support the achievement of the desired Strategic Outcome(s).

program (programme):

A group of related resource inputs and activities that are managed to meet specific needs and to achieve intended results and that are treated as a budgetary unit.

Program Alignment Architecture (architecture d’alignement des programmes):

A structured inventory of an organization’s programs depicting the hierarchical relationship between programs and the Strategic Outcome(s) to which they contribute.

Report on Plans and Priorities (rapport sur les plans et les priorités):

Provides information on the plans and expected performance of appropriated organizations over a three-year period. These reports are tabled in Parliament each spring.

results (résultat):

An external consequence attributed, in part, to an organization, policy, program or initiative. Results are not within the control of a single organization, policy, program or initiative; instead they are within the area of the organization’s influence.

statutory expenditures (dépenses législatives):

Expenditures that Parliament has approved through legislation other than appropriation acts. The legislation sets out the purpose of the expenditures and the terms and conditions under which they may be made.

Strategic Outcome (résultat stratégique):

A long-term and enduring benefit to Canadians that is linked to the organization’s mandate, vision and core functions.

sunset program (programme temporisé):

A time-limited program that does not have an ongoing funding and policy authority. When the program is set to expire, a decision must be made whether to continue the program. In the case of a renewal, the decision specifies the scope, funding level and duration.

target (cible):

A measurable performance or success level that an organization, program or initiative plans to achieve within a specified time period. Targets can be either quantitative or qualitative.

voted expenditures (dépenses votées):

Expenditures that Parliament approves annually through an Appropriation Act. The Vote wording becomes the governing conditions under which these expenditures may be made.

Whole-of-government framework (cadre pangouvernemental):

Maps the financial contributions of federal organizations receiving appropriations by aligning their Programs to a set of 16 government-wide, high-level outcome areas, grouped under four spending areas.