Gender-Based Analysis Plus - 2020-21 Departmental Plan – Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat

Governance structures

The Government of Canada is committed to applying gender-based analysis plus (GBA+) when making decisions.

When departments seek Treasury Board approval for new spending proposals or authorities, they must identify any relevant gender issues and the steps they will take to meet the needs of men, women, and gender-diverse individuals. The Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS) reviews the information and analysis that departments provide and advises Treasury Board ministers, where appropriate, on the gender implications of approving proposals.

All TBS managers and analysts are responsible for supporting GBA+ implementation in their roles, as appropriate. In addition, TBS has designated a GBA+ champion at the assistant deputy minister level, and since 2019 this person has been supported by an employee co‑champion. Together, the two champions:

• promote the value of GBA+ in informing Cabinet decision‑making
• provide guidance to TBS’s senior managers on their responsibilities with respect to GBA+
• promote training for TBS employees so that they can incorporate GBA+ into carrying out TBS’s challenge function
• promote the value of GBA+ in and outside TBS through, for example, GBA+ Awareness Week, speaking engagements, and presentations to internal and external management committees

In 2020–21, TBS will focus on the following key activities to support GBA+ governance:

• forming an advisory committee on learning, led by a champion, to determine the learning needs of the various functional communities at TBS, including the need for GBA+ training
• consulting operational and governance committees at TBS about  how TBS will meet its GBA+ responsibilities and how it will report on the extent to which GBA+ is included in decision‑making
• allocating time on the agendas of meetings of the Public Service Management Advisory Committee for the Deputy Minister of Women and Gender Equality to consult fellow deputy heads on the status of government-wide implementation of GBA+ and its impacts on legislative, policy, and program initiatives

Human resources

The GBA+ champion is supported by the work of an employee-level co-champion (0.3 full‑time equivalent), as well as the part-time work of 2 analysts (total of 0.3 full-time equivalents).

A number of employees throughout TBS work part-time on GBA+ implementation, for a total of 9.0 to 10.0 FTEs.

Planned initiatives

In 2020–21, TBS will build on the following:

• Nothing Without Us, an accessibility strategy for the public service, was launched in 2019. The strategy has 5 key goals, which align with GBA+:
  • improve recruitment, retention and promotion of persons with disabilities
  • enhance the accessibility of the built environment
  • make communications technology usable by all
  • equip public servants to design and deliver accessible programs and services
  • build an accessibility-confident public service
• The Canadian Gender Budgeting Act, which was enacted on December 13, 2018. Under the act, TBS will make the analysis of the impacts of existing Government of Canada expenditure programs on gender and diversity available to the public. To help improve the quality of the analyses provided, TBS will work with departments to strengthen their data collection, performance measurement and evaluation activities. 
• The Innovation and Skills Plan announced in Budget 2018, which included establishing a team at TBS to improve performance and impact assessments for innovation-related programs. This team will apply GBA+ considerations to data collection, and to policy, performance, and evaluation activities. The data collection and analysis undertaken will allow the team to delve deeper into the data and to experiment with disaggregating information based on GBA+ characteristics.
• A policy direction, which the Clerk of the Privy Council approved in November 2018, that covers how federal departments collect, use and display sex and gender information. All departments and agencies in the core public administration, including TBS, are responsible for implementing this policy direction. TBS has also allocated resources for a limited period of time to support departments’ implementation efforts. Specifically, so that the policy direction will have the greatest impact in a short timeframe, TBS is providing additional support to the top 40 high‑volume, high-impact government services that involve sex or gender information.
• The new Cabinet Directive on Regulation, which TBS published in 2018–19. This directive requires that departments and agencies undertake an assessment of social and economic impacts of each regulatory proposal on diverse groups of Canadians, in accordance with the Government of Canada’s commitment to implement GBA+. TBS will continue to provide guidance and tools to support departments and agencies as they undertake the assessment.
• The Dr. Roberta Bondar Career Development Program for Women in Science and Technology, which was launched in 2016 by Women In Communications and Technology. TBS will lead the delivery of the program with Women In Communications and Technology and Microsoft.
• Canada’s 2018–2020 Action Plan on Open Government, which committed to feminist and inclusive dialogue. TBS will continue to strive for open government that benefits all Canadians. In developing Canada’s 2020–2022 National Action Plan on Open Government, TBS will support greater inclusion and diversity in public engagement activities and in other open government activities.

With respect to TBS’s internal operations, the employee GBA+ co‑champion will undertake a number of corporate initiatives, including distributing pronoun nameplates at TBS, and incorporating a gender tag option in GCdirectory.

Reporting capacity and data

Two TBS programs encompass services that collect microdata on individual recipients:

• Internal Services
• Digital Policy Program

Names and addresses collected under these programs are collected in full compliance with all privacy requirements. No aggregated data or related GBA+ analysis are publicly reported.