Looks like Tony Clement’s pants are on fire once again!
Another one of Tony Clement’s lies bit the dust yesterday thanks to a report by the Parliamentary Budget Office. The report echoed what we’ve been saying all along: federal public service sick leave costs almost nothing.
The report revealed that most public servants aren’t replaced while on sick leave; that’s hardly a revelation to most of us, we know!
There are, of course, some departments that do backfill employees due to operational requirements. That said, the report contends that the cost of doing this would only be significant if it “exceeded $500 million government-wide or 10 per cent of a department’s budget.”
The department with the highest sick leave-related costs averaged 2.74% of overall department expenditures, with most core public service departments falling anywhere between 0.16% to 1.5%.
That’s a far cry from 10%!
What’s even more revealing is that Correctional Services Canada and Canadian Border Security Agency, the two departments where employees use the most sick leave, clearly have unique workplace hazards that could easily explain the higher occurrence.
The Parliamentary Budget Office also reiterated its findings from an earlier report; public servants use an average of 11.52 sick days per year; a number in line with the private sector’s 11.3 sick days per year.
You can find out more by consulting the following articles:
Civil servant sick leave costs minimal for taxpayers, report says – Globe and Mail
Public Servants’ sick days immaterial to Ottawa’s bottom line, report says – CBC