Good article - it's great to get some balance on this issue. The PS isn't doing anything that any other nation-wide employer doesn't do in one form or another. Imagine griping because Corel or E.A. Games or Microsoft holds one-time orientation seminars at their head offices. Moreover, the federal civil service fulfills a unique roll in the governance of the country and the delivery of services to the citizenry. This isn't a McDonald's chain - it's the national government.

Also, we need to consider that it might be even more expensive to set up separate facilities in the regions for this kind of orientation to take place. Even so, travel expenses will be inevitably be incurred (i.e. Prince George employees would still likely have to travel to Vancouver for a couple days). Using technology (webcasting, internet courses, etc.) can bridge distances to some degree but with greatly diminished effectiveness. Once you start watering it down that way, you have to ask why do it at all.

On the face of it, this program looks like a great way to rehabilitate professionalism, identity, ethics, best practices and overall knowledge in a civil service that has been ravaged by the austerity measures of the nineties (Program Review, etc.) and by chronic political interference and scandal under increasingly corrupt Liberal rule.

If the orientation includes a visit to Chuck Guite in jail, it's money well spent. That way they can learn about "values, ethics, accountability".

Interesting article, I was glad to see the cliched "Taxpayers Federation quote" was mentioned. I think it's lazy journalism to use these guys, they're response is predictable and I rarely hear them offer any alternative models or solutions.

I can appreciate they want to safe guard tax payers from excessive government spending but I get the feeling that if the TPF had their way we'd pay no taxes and get no services.

The MSM always wants to harp about "professional protesters" who gather at rallies but they're always willing to stick a microphone in front of these ones.

The biggest problem with this program is (was?) that salary, travel costs and per diem would have to be covered by the local unit. This money would have to come out of the budget for hiring and training.

I work for the government, and when the word first came out about this program I was appalled, and you could see the collective rolling of eyes by other government employees. My union felt that this program is a waste. Management agrees that it's a waste. But this is a Treasury Board directive so we have to do what they tell us. In any case, the money should be spent on more training and hiring if necessary.

If the government wants to do orientation for new employees there are better and more cost effective ways of going about it.

did this new program apply to term employees or just indeterminate employees?

the federal government has been loathe to hire indeterminate employees for some time as it guts the civil service.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation strikes again. This well funded right wing think tank mirrors the Fraser Institute, with ties to Stephen Harper and the Conservative party. They have very specific platforms mostly involving reduction of publicly funded policies which benefit the greater good. They're all for big business. They use the same old tired technique invented by conservative think tanks like the Heritage Institute: ridicule programs, belittle initiatives, distort facts. Of course, their biggest fan is Canada's closely owned media families, like CanWest Global and David Black. Thanks again to the Tyee and Peter for offering thoughtful analysis to important topics.

Nightbloom, I'd be interested in examples of private-sector employers that fly all new hires across Canada for orientation. I've never heard of such a thing.

My first job out of consulting was as a manager in a publicly traded company with head offices in Chicago. We did have local training, Western Canada Training and we did have a management meeting in Las Vegas. However, these were critical in undertanding and comminucating our directives.

These only occurred with new product launches or pricing strategies. These initiatives were critical.

This is a flat out waste of money and verso - the Taxpayers Federation did provide an alternative - don't spend the money!!

All this said, I think we have bigger spending issues at hand. We are wasting all sorts of money at all levels of government.

Indeterminate employees only. They've finally started opening the door on indeterminate hires for the first time in nearly 15 years. They've got a major HR crisis on their hands. The
only people who actually know how the whole thing works are about the enter retirement, and the traditional feeder-groups are totally depleted. The federal civil service is about to lose a whole lot of know-how over the next few years. It's going to be a big problem that manifests itself in a million little ways.

I support this orientation program, but it's important to remember that this idea was brought in by the Liberals, so the Conservatives are not tied it in any way. If the media stirs the pot enough, the Conservatives will dump it. That really is too bad.

It's good to see articles like this that point out the right-wing bias of the mainstream press and CanWest in particular.

The corporate press likes to jump all over the tiniest government waste, but they don't spend even a fraction of the same time on similar waste in the private sector. There is never enough discussion of the waste associated with overpaid corporate executives who frequently drive the companies they manage into the ground while receiving enourmous amounts of money to do so. That behaviour has a huge negative impact on the economy.

What's more the kneejerk federal financial strangulation policies of the neoConservatives are simply bolstered by the sort of ideologically biased nonsense that appears in the corporate press. You get neoCons like Capitalism/Maybelle piping up that Medicare should be eliminated, all in their effort to destroy any and all social bonds that make up Canada in order to make all the divided parts all that easier to exploit and sell off. Of course they disguse it as argument against waste.

With one caveat, James B - It's the Chretien Liberals that gutted the federal civil service and its programming, and effectively dismantled the Just Society. This orientation program for the new generation of public servants was just one small attempt to restore what was lost. As usual, the career opportunities/development of the younger generation is going to be curtailed and smothered because the crusty boomers want to have their cake and eat it too.

Capitalism/ Maybelle

I bet you and the other girls just loved the training in Vegas.

Nobody can waste money, steal and convert it to their own selfish purposes like the private sector. There are quite a few felons serving long-term sentences in jail for that – we all know their names.

I see Connie Black, who couldn't wait to get out of Canada and deny his citizenship so he could call himself a Lord, has scuttled back here now that he's not such a hot commodity with his right-wing friends in Washington too.

Capitalism does have a few lessons to teach us - especially about the kind of behavior that'll get you into trouble.

A professional civil service is vital – not that you’d know one if you saw one cappy.

James Burns:

I am sorry but this quote really bothers me:

Firstly, they do - I am not sure if you have ever read a business section or the Financial Post. It is not their fault that nobody cares enough about it to put it in the front pages. Executives are subject to all kinds of risk including lawsuits and loss of reputation.

More importantly it is not their responsibility to do this. Corporations do not use tax dollars and public funds to conduct their operations. They are governed by their board of directors, who have the responsiblity to act on behalf of the shareholders. Corporate Governance in Canada and the USA is improving.

The government takes over 50% of my money, and that is why I (and most people) care about how they spend it. I care about how Telus compensates their executives because I am a shareholder.

The government and corporations are subject to different rules. The economy is best suited if corporations are subject to few regulations outside of the prevailing market forces. Supply/Demand generally holds a corporation's feet to the fire. It is proven that the more governments interfere in the conduct of business, the less effecient business are.

The government is not publicly accountable to shareholders, and as a result more inefficiencies exist.

I don't suppose that anyone have heard of teleconferencing?
It is as good as being there, but without the cost and bother.
If anyone needs training it would be some employees in Quebec, who do not attempt to communicate in English with people who do not happen to speak French.

Of course, if you really want to inflict a penitential element in into the orientation program, you could always stimulate that it's activities be confined to the winter months...

Capitalism/Maybell writes in reference to corporate press reporting on corporate malfeasance:

No mostly they don't. They only go after the biggest scandals that are next to impossible to ignore. Those isolated examples are then held up as proof that the corporate press actually gets its lazy ass out into the world to do some investigative reporting, when nothing could be further from the truth.

The financial sections of the corporate press are primarily cheering sections for speculative markets, and overpaid corporate thieves.

They don't cover the unbelievably huge amounts of money stolen via offshore banking through transfer mispricing. They hardly cover the immense waste and theft of P3 contracts. I've seen next to no coverage of the theft of tax payer dollars by corporate interests in the so-called rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Corporations have become a blight on society precisely because they have been allowed to buy themselves a deregulated marketplace that lets them pay a pittance for resources and labour, and then move the profits into tax havens using transfer mispricing.

No society can sustain that kind of theft indefinitely. But the reason it doesn't get covered in the corporate press is simply because they are a part of the crime.

Capitalism/Maybelle
I think you'll find increasingly that it is their responsibility to do this.
The bad old days when the only thing that was important is return to shareholders is crap. You don't give up 50% of your money to the government and you know it. Even if you pay the highest marginal rate of tax that's not true and to pretend it is means you don't understand progressive tax rates.

But that's beside the point and not to mention a whole lot of other advantages that corporate business structure affords you whiners in the business sphere. Corporate citizens ought to have and willingly accept decent moral values - Talisman is a good example of a company that has none. Worshipping the bottom line is not a moral value and corporate responsibility is almost always an oxymoron.

Some do, but most don't. And, when corporate structures actually do do something responsible you can be sure they'll do it in a way that maximizes their tax advantages and makes it appear they are doing something selfless when in fact they're not.

The Canadian Bankers Association is currently paying $25,000 to the conference of the Canadian Chiefs of Police. Why?

Alcibaides -

When you add up the PST/GST, fuel taxes, income taxes, corporate taxes, payroll taxes, EI, CPP, property taxes and utilities taxes - I can assure you that well over 50% of my net take home is taken by the government. Trust me...

It is the single most important issue to me - taxes....

Two days in the swamp with one night in Hull. All expenses paid. Groovey. BCFeddies need not apply.

Furthermore, I do understand the concept of progressive tax rates. However, not the concept of theft that you speak of.

The flat tax is progressive in itself. For example if you make $50K and pay a 20% flat tax, you will pay $10K in income tax.

If you make 100K and pay a 20% flat tax, you will pay $20K in taxes....or double!

So - if you make twice as much money, you pay twice as much. Furthermore, the more you make, the more you spend and the more you spend - the more you are taxed!!!

In this Liberal/Socialist revolution that occured between the 30's and 80's - somehow this escalating tax evolved - which might I add does not exist in thriving economies including Hong Kong, Texas, Alberta and Florida amoung others....

Now, it is impossible to get rid of. I don't know when you commies will come to the realization that rich peope are rich for a reason - they invest! When the invest, people become employed. The more you tax them, the less they invest...

I realize that a degree of government interference is necessary to ensure that there is accountability and the poorest are taken care of. However, we have gone too far!

Everybody pays PST/GST and it has nothing to do with income so forget that. If you don't want to pay consumption taxes don't consume so much. Same goes for fuel taxes - unless they are expensed for commercial or business use - in which case they are a pre-tax expense. Payroll taxes are also an expense for corporate purposes and I think you'll find - if you pay individual income tax - that they are deducted before you calculate your taxable income too. Property taxes and utility taxes are also questions of individual choice, or, for business purposes - are deductible.

Cry me a river.

Capitalism/Maybell writes:

Sure, they steal.

Then why don`t you hang out at the Canadian Taxpayers Association or whatever its called site...you bloody bore!

Anything that can be done to expand the vista for insular B.C. is a good thing.

Managing an orientation program properly is something else, but poor management, of which B.C. is renowned for, should not be a reason to scuttle the entire program.

It's time for B.C. to wake up and become part of Canada. If we don't take the initiative, no one will do it on our behalf.

Maybelle:
Furthermore, unless you live in unorganized territory and don't get water, sewage, police, fire, school, roads and other public amenities I'd say your property tax is also just paying a share of those costs. It shouldn't even really be called a tax - relating it to property values is just the traditional way it's been done. In some jurisdictions they do it differently - but it has nothing to do with income so you also shouldn’t see it it as part of your fictional 50%.

Unfortunately, the Vancouver Sun editors tend to "make the news" instead of report it.

Making the news is a by-product of "checkbook" journalism.

Noam Chomsky refers to it as "necessary illusion" when news media use the art of distraction sell you a story that has little or no "news value," but serves to say, "We're doing our part to serve the community."

In our modern era, mainstream news media's first obligation is to sell advertising, not report the news.

If you ever travelled to Ottawa you would know this. LOL

And, if you sell your house and make a huge capital gain Maybelle, it's free. If you have two houses and sell one the capital gain is only taxed at 50% of the normal rate - which is a bargain no wage earner ever gets on ANY of his income.

Cry me another river. I haven't even mentioned dividend tax credits and other capital gains income - you sure you want to continue this?

Of possible tangential interest to the semi-regulars on these threads:

The poet of dialectics
http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1814909,00.html

"Karl Marx's Das Kapital is a ground-breaking work of economic analysis. But, argues Francis Wheen, it is also an unfinished literary masterpiece which, with its multi-layered structure, can be read as a Gothic novel, a Victorian melodrama, a Greek tragedy or a Swiftian satire..."

Getting back to the issue at hand. This orientation is "in theory" a good idea. Learning the workings of the government for whom you work for? Sounds like a plan to me. Even better if you can do it where government is. Also, when looking at the costs, I imagine that airfare and 2 days hotel costs are not that much more that the price of a week long convention. Some conventions charge 700 - 1000 dollars - just to attend. The point is, i guess, that there is a need to allocate resources towards employee development. Whether it is through courses (which can run several thousands of dollars), conventions (when you tack on airfare, etc. can run several thoughsand of dollars), or an orientation session (which in my mind, seems like the cheaper of the three), employee development is essential. It doesn't matter if your public or private.

nightbloom:

Actually, this program is also for term employees hired for more than 6 months, not just indeterminates.

ubiquitous:

The problem is that the travel costs, etc. come out of the training and hiring budget for the local units. I am a government employee and I think that this program is a joke. Every one of my co-workers thinks it is a joke. Management thinks it's a joke. It will take money away from necessary training only to send the new hires on an all expense paid jolly. How does that improve the public service? This plan is the perfect example of a committee designed policy which appears to address a problem, only to spend more money to create a bigger problem.

I was speaking from a "not fully informed" opinion Stan. I'm not sure how the federal government allocates its budget when it comes to employee development. I also don't know what goes on at these orientation sessions, but I believe that if it provides a better understanding of how the government machinery works, then it is beneficial to the ps. A university course regarding government institutions could run up to 1000 dollars - and possibly 2 or 3 times as much if offered through a private company. I guess my point is if it can be shown that these trips result in employee development, then I don't see a problem with them (hence my saying that "in theory" they're a good idea). If they are simply an "all expense paid jolly" - well that's a different story.

Fantastic article. It's so easy, so cynical, so *cowardly* to take this knee-jerk stance against the civil service. Then the same folks wonder why so many people are reluctant to work for the government...

Agreed. And let's not mention that the salary scale in the Public Service is way behind that of private sector professionals with analogous duties, educational background and experience. It's got a measure of security, but I'd hardly call it a sweet deal by any stretch of the imagination.

Why don't they use those two 50 million = 100 million dollar luxury jets Jean Chrétien bought with taxpayer money?
Where R they now?

thanks for the Guardian Review link nightbloom..its a keeper.

this is the dumbest of totally dumb ideas that any Silly Servant has ever come up with up. Someone is terminally stuck on stupid.

Why do all the Fed offices in Ottawa have a yellow line down the middle of the hallways ??

So the ones leaving early won't bump into the ones arriving late . . .

Kill off this idiotic program.

Every other mature liberal democracy has an analogy to the Canada School of Public Service and its orientation efforts. It's especially important in the federalized democracies, of which we're the biggest and most complex.

Here's the Australia & New Zealand counterpart - the Australia and New Zealand School of Government:
http://www.anzsog.edu.au/

The United Kingdom's counterpart:
http://www.nationalschool.gov.uk/

France's version:
http://www.ena.fr/accueil.php

Even Quebec is on top of its game:
http://www.enap.uquebec.ca/enap/fr/accueil.aspx

So why does puritanical English Canada have to crap its drawers at the thought of joining every other national government and professional civil service in the 21st century...?

Well as a Federal Civil Servant I was appalled when I found about this idea and not at all surprised by the creators of it. The School of Public Service seems to have money coming out of it’s Ying Yang for all sorts of stuff, the quality of their printed material down to the two colour name cards for students was a waste of money.

The plan was for people to travel to Ottawa for a course that would have funding for the course paid for out of Ottawa, put travel costs, overtime and back filling would be borne by the Employee’s department, a very real and significant cost. Not to mention that as a new employee you are supposed to be learning your job and might only have a week with the previous person teaching you if you are lucky. Who exactly was supposed to do their job while they are away?

If you want to teach people about the government, then make a DVD and send it out. I have been in my current job for 8 years and they haven’t been able to get any funding to actually run a course to teach us how to do it, we all had to learn the hard way. There is never money for the courses we need, but lots kicking around for: diversity, harassment, conflict resolution, etc,etc. When they transferred our unit from one department to another, the new department told us that all of the required diversity, harassment and conflict course we had taken at the previous department were not good enough and would have to do it again. Arrrgh!

Here is an idea, when someone has worked their butt off or done an exceptional job, reward them with the trip to Ottawa in the summertime.

I wonder if the fact that Government employees always get gouged on air travel , especially to Ottawa, if this wasn’t a way of pumping money into Air Canada’s coffers?

Nightbloom
You are correct they are finally starting to fill indeterminate positions, although fisheries is still one of the worst departments for casuals. Also the Liberals worked very hard to politicalize the civil service, the senior mangers owed their career to their political bosses and not to their service within the department. The concept of working your way through a department and knowing it inside and out has fallen to the wayside.

But travel costs, overtime and back filling would be borne by the Employee’s department, a very real and significant cost.

sorry

If the local government dept. has to pay for the trip and salary, I would say it may actually make the local unit a bit shy about new hires being taken on.
This program also applies to those contracted by the Govt. for more than 6 months.
Perhaps an online orientation, with virtual tours, and a professional course could be sufficient for a large amount of these employees.

Paul Willcocks:

One of my earlier jobs was for Western Airlines who hired me and two other guys for Vancouver's flight terminal and flew us to LA for five days training. good training, but they only gave us $25 US for expenses, but booked us into an $80US a night hotel next to the airport (that we were supposed to pay for!) and fed us only breakfast for the day. Hmmm. I'm sure that's only one reason why they went bankrupt two years later.

Nevertheless, that's the only one. All my other employers, if they haven't had in-house training, have flown the trainer in to meet with a group of us - with all the bells and whistles.

zalm,

nobody disagrees with the merits of training. however, it sounds as if though this is a fluff course, and could be taught through a pamphlet or CD.

It should be noted that this program does not even have the support of the Public Service Alliance of Canada - the union for federal workers!

They rightly pointed out that the money would be better spent making temporary and contract workers permanent employees.

I can't believe Tyee readers think sending thousands of new employees to Ottawa for two days is a better expenditure of our taxpayer money than hiring more food inspectors, parks rangers, customs guards and workers for all the other valuable federal services we receive!

Tileman - I would prefer spend the money than hire more public service workers. Once you hire these guys, you can't get rid of them.

You can always stop this program. These costs should be returned to the tax payer through tax cuts or infrastructural improvements. I do agree that we should hire more customs workers to secure our borders though!

There is a real crisis in Canada as affordability continues to erode. Return the money to the people!

You don't deserve any more tax cuts, Maybelle, you'd just waste it in Vegas. The sooner you have to spend the rewards of the tax breaks you already have in Canada, the better for the Canadian economy.

At least the costs of this program would (it will certainly be cancelled by the way) be spent in this country - unlike your junkets which are also financed by an unfair tax system.

Thanks all. It's been interesting to follow the discussion on this story. I appreciate all of your comments. (Okay, well, almost all of them, I think)

I want to reiterate that while I think the money should be spent so that the program can be properly evaluated, I am not in favour of this program running indefinitely, irrespective of its performance.

If there are compelling reasons -- as several posters with direct experience of the public service suggest -- for this program to be cancelled before it has begun, then I'm sure it might have been possible for the Sun to make this case without playing up bad stereotypes and reaching for the easy quote.

One comment offered several links to different national schools of public service. Readers might be interested to learn more about one tangentially related initiative in the UK aimed at raising the esteem and professionalism of teachers: The National College for School Leadership.

http://www.ncsl.org.uk/

Expensive, probably. But what if it was worth it? Would our current biases even allow a fair hearing for this kind of public investment?

Capitalism
The civil Service was already cut quite a bit in the 90’s, however it’s duties and responsibilities weren’t. This means that contractors seeking permits or inspections have to wait for the overworked inspector to finish the task so the contractor can carry on.

If you wish to cut the size of government, go through Parliament/Legislature to strike down some of the Acts first and then let the Civil Service whittle down by attrition. As it is now, the politicians will cut the funding for a program, but not the legal requirements for it, leaving both the Civil Servant and the client in a lurch. They do this as striking down an Act can cause to much political heat.

Plus Canadians love to demand new and more overarching laws without considering the implications, I must get 5 phones calls a day by some citizen demanding a law against this or that. Many of these Acts conflict with each other telling the proponent to do such and such, which is in clear violation of another Act, which means the civil servants have to sit down and hammer out an solution for each situation and that can be time consuming.

Peter says above:

Answer: NO!

Teachers in British Columbia get a fair hearing!

I don't think so. The last time the subject of teachers, schools and the foreign concept of excellent public education and fair pay for teachers came up at the Tyee there were responses even more negative than the ones featured above.

For example, one armchair critic even opined that there was something wrong with a volunteer teacher taking on the role of social justice coordinator in his/her school. Couldn't see the point of it and suggested it would just be another opportunity for teachers to promote left-wing ideas.

Can you imagine the response to the UK effort were it transplanted here?

Thanks for the thoughtful article, by the way.

I’ll now wait for some of the usual suspects fire up their keyboards & rail on about how responsible the current offer on the table is for the BCTF and how Liberal popularity has never been higher and how the greedy teachers have settled for a cash bonus and a one-time payment of $300 in recompense for personal career outlays of a least 10 times that amount.

Oh, one other near certainty, there will be ad hominem attacks directed at Jinny Simms.

Hey the Feds are just trying to take the heat off of the real BS happening in the back room deals & it is working.

By what perverse standard should the PSAC politbureau have any decisive veto over government programming?

And PSAC went along with the temp/contract mill all thru the 1990s & the first half of the 00s in order to preserve the priviledges of their core members. PSAC is very, very late in cominig to the defence of the temps & contractors (mostly young professionals in their twenties and thirties) at this late juncture now that their membership is finally cycling out of the workforce into retirement.

Park rangers and mail clerks - Puhleeeeze. The vast majority of the beneficiaries of this programme will be those working in service delivery capacities at front-line positions dealing with the Canadian public, or in the entry- and middle-management feeder groups.

Apparently, you'd only save about $66 per capita by holding it in the regional urban centres (since set-up & travel expenses will still be incurred), with a loss of any benefits associated with bringing them to the national capital.

Shame nightbloom. Even when you're trying to make a valid point about the need for training a professional civil service (things I agree with btw) you can't resist making some kind of dig at your favourite hobbyhorse, can you?

Most of the criticism of this program comes from the troglodyte right - if you want to cast aspersions, cast them in the 'right' direction.

Please explain why the instructions have to be face-to-face?
Teleconferencing is a usefull tool, and allows of as much interaction as you will find in any hotel-conference room, and the bonus would be that you will not be offered the famous "styrofoam chicken" for lunch!
What is so great about going "redeye" to a crowded meeting anyway?

Teleconferencing is great for short and rapid exchanges of information among executives who are already well established in their roles and very familiar with the format. It's next to useless for this kind of thing. Imagine spending two or three days on a conference call listening to someone explain how the Parliament, PMO and the central agencies interact. There are also a lot of other aspects to be gained by exposure to Ottawa, not least an appreciation for the collective identity of the national government and civil service, a hands-on encounter with the national reality of bilingualism in the nation's capital, exposure to the culture of government, a knowledge that they are part of a large organization that offers them benefits and opportunities worth sticking around for...

Okay, Mister Holier-than-Thou ;-) ...But you gotta admit that Tielemans's faux outrage is a little contrived. Neither the PSC nor Treasury Board are obliged to ask PSAC to vet their decisions. This isn't the Soviet Union. As a West Coast commentator, you'd think he'd be applauding the attempt by Ottawa to bridge distances with the regions. We're a geographically massive federation of diverse jurisdictions, so we need to see this program as simply part of the cost of doing business for government in the 21st century.

BTW - for anyone following the long-standing tussle on these threads about Leo Strauss and his thought, the NYT has published a review of a book that takes a more generous (and in my opinion for fair) look at Strauss and his thought:

Democracy's Best Friend or Antidemocratic Elitist?
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/10/arts/10conn.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

nightbloom
Of course it's not the USSR - politburo was excessive, that's all. You gotta work on that sense of humour!

I actually have another piece on my computer at home written by Strauss' daughter...makes much the same point, I'd wager. I'll post it for you tonight if work doesn't keep me here too late.

There was a pair of interesting pieces in the NY Review of Books a year or two ago as well. My copies are somewhere in the bottom of a box. They divided his career into two distinct phases: Europe and America with the subsequent analysis of the two periods yielding very different results, but not so much because of any big change in Strauss or his beliefs and/or teachings.

Right executives realize their time is expensive, so they forego the long travels by teleconferencing!
That same medium can as easily be used to relay long demonstrations, and it has the advantage (over a packed room) that individual attention can be made.
If you suggest that the candidates miss out on establishing a "network" by not being there, you are right, and just as well!
It would be great if matters got settled on its merits , and not depending on who has a "friend" in Ottawa

Well having suffered through many telephone and Videoconferences, I won’t wish a 2 day session on anyone.

The issue here is not about have a well trained professional and NON-POLITCAL Civil Service, that is a given for a Western democracy to function properly. The issue is about appropriate use of the finite training dollars and time that is available. Sending people to Ottawa to “learn about government” is nice feel good effort that is not a high priority. Better the money is spent on succession planning and implementation of a rapidly graying and aging workforce or on boosting the amount of training dollars to enable people to grapple with the implications of the intertwining Acts or here is a novel thought, enough money to carry out the site inspections and enforcement actions required by many of these Acts.

As always lots of money for fluff, never much for nitty gritty day to day work.

Actually as a taxpayer i do not worry too much about their comfort!
If the training can be done more effeciently that way, then that is how it should be!
But i agree that monies are wasted left and right!
oh oh sorry, I said left and right, did not mean to state politics here. lol

nightbloom:
Here's the piece on Strauss written by his daughter. It's from the NY Times, June 7 2003. I'll have to post it in two sections because of its length. Sorry this is so late - it has been a busy day.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va.
Recent news articles have portrayed my father, Leo Strauss, as the mastermind behind the neoconservative ideologues who control United States foreign policy. He reaches out from his 30-year-old grave, we are told, to direct a "cabal" (a word with distinct anti-Semitic overtones) of Bush administration figures hoping to subject the American people to rule by a ruthless elite. I do not recognize the Leo Strauss presented in these articles.

My father was not a politician. He taught political theory, primarily at the University of Chicago. He was a conservative insofar as he did not think that change is necessarily change for the better.

Leo Strauss believed in the intrinsic dignity of the political. He believed in and defended liberal democracy; although he was not blind to its flaws, he felt it was the best form of government that could be realized, "the last best hope." He was an enemy of any regime that aspired to global domination. He despised utopianism — in our time, Nazism and Communism — which is predicated on the denial of a fundamental and even noble feature of human nature: love of one's own. His heroes were Churchill and Lincoln. He was not an observant Jew, but he loved the Jewish people and he saw the establishment of Israel as essential to their survival.

To me, what characterized him above all else was his total lack of vanity and self-importance. As a result, he had no interest in honors within the academy, and was completely unsuited to political ambition. His own earliest passion, he confessed, was to spend his life raising rabbits (Flemish Giants) and reading Plato.

He was first and foremost a teacher. He did not seek to mold people in his own image. Rather, he was devoted to helping young people see the world as it is, in all its misery and splendor. The objects of his teaching were the Great Books, those works generally recognized as the foundation of a liberal education. But that alone was not a sufficient reason for reading them.

He began where good teachers should begin, from his students' received opinions, in order to scrutinize their foundation. At that time, as is still true today, academia leaned to the left; hence such questioning required an examination of the left's tenets. Had the prevailing beliefs been different, they too would have been subject to his skeptical inquiry.

and here's the rest of it:

Furthermore, he insistently confronted his students with the question of the "good life." For him, the choice boiled down to the life in accordance with Revelation or the life according to Reason — Jerusalem versus Athens. The vitality of Western tradition, he felt, lay in the invigorating tension between the two.

My father saw reading not as a passive exercise but as taking part in an active dialogue with the great minds of the past. One had to read with great care, great respect, and try, as he always said, to "understand the author as he understood himself." Today this task, admittedly difficult and demanding, is dismissed in fashionable academia as impossible. Rather, we are told, each reader inevitably constructs his own text over which the author has no control, and the writer's intentions are irrelevant.

The fact is that Leo Strauss also recognized a multiplicity of readers, but he had enough faith in his authors to assume that they, too, recognized that they would have a diverse readership. Some of their readers, the ancients realized, would want only to find their own views and prejudices confirmed; others might be willing to open themselves to new, perhaps unconventional or unpopular, ideas. I personally think my father's rediscovery of the art of writing for different kinds of readers will be his most lasting legacy.

Although I was never a student of my father's, I sat in on a class of his in the 1960's; I think it was on Xenophon's "Cyropaedia." He was a small, unprepossessing and, truth be told, ugly man (daughters are their parents' worst critics), with none of the charisma that one associates with "great teachers." And yet there was something utterly charming. One of the students would read little chunks of the text, and my father would comment and call for discussion. What marked this class was a combination of an engagement with questions of the highest seriousness (in this case, what is the best form of government) with the laughter of intellectual play.

It was magic. If only the truth had the power to make the misrepresentations of his achievement vanish like smoke and dust.

Jenny Strauss Clay is a professor of classics at the University of Virginia.

Let me know what you think.

Lovely article by Strauss' daughter - Thanks Gwest.

nightbloom
There's another interesting piece in the current New Yorker, by George Packer - you can find it here:
http://www.newyorker.com/critics/books/articles/060710crbo_books