
Conservatives say they could shrink federal workforce by 17,000 yearly by not replacing leavers
‘Each year, more than 17,000 employees leave the public service and reductions can be made by simply not backfilling vacant positions’
OTTAWA — The Conservative party added more detail Wednesday to its leader’s plan to shrink the federal public service, saying the bureaucracy could be cut by 17,000 jobs a year just by not replacing employees who leave their jobs.
“Each year, more than 17,000 employees leave the public service and reductions can be made by simply not backfilling vacant positions,” Conservative deputy leader Melissa Lantsman said in a statement to National Post.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre had raised his plan to shrink the federal service in a discussion Tuesday with a Quebec radio station. He said there are “way too many bureaucrats” and that if his party were elected to government it would find ways to monitor the productivity of civil servants because “work isn’t getting done.”
“We… need fewer bureaucrats,” he said in French. “I’m going to reduce the size of the bureaucracy and the state.”
“Right now, I see that the work isn’t getting done in the federal government,” he added. “We must put in place methods to ensure the work is done.” Neither he nor his office detailed what kind of methods he had in mind.
In her statement, Lantsman said the leader’s comments shouldn’t shock anyone.
“The notion of demanding value for taxpayer dollars should not be controversial. Nor should it be controversial in any workplace to ensure work is completed to standard in a timely manner,” Lantsman wrote.
She also reiterated a point made by Poilievre that the public service’s size and cost had grown tremendously under the Liberal government since 2015.