Paula Kielstra loved her job at Library and Archives Canada, but when she received a letter saying positions in her unit would be hit by a wave of federal cuts, she hand-raised to be laid off. The policy advisor and mother of two said it was “a very difficult decision” that has thrown her family into financial distress, but it gave her a chance to support her son with special needs. Kielstra is just one of 10,000 federal employees who lost their jobs under the Trudeau government’s cuts, a quiet round of “workforce adjustment” that began last year and is still playing out across departments. Now, Mark Carney is dramatically expanding those reductions, unveiling in the budget last week a sweeping plan to “right size” the federal bureaucracy. To achieve that, Ottawa intends to eliminate about 10 per cent of federal public service jobs—an estimated further 30,000 positions by the end of 2029. For those caught in the crosshairs, the human impact has been immediate and...
A discussion on political, economic and social issues in British Columbia, and Canada