We Canadians

Acting President PIPSC

“I am not a big fan of public-private partnerships” says Gary Corbett, acting President of PIPSC, one of the largest public sector unions in the country.  He believes this type of unequal partnership is sometimes ineffective because the ultimate responsibility  for the work remains with the government.

He cites the example of a road contructed under a  public-private partnership.  The road was not salted properly during the winter and this led to a tragic accident . Guess who was sued as a result? It was not the private company, but, rather, the government  simply because  it has deeper pockets.

In his wide-ranging interview with We Canadians, Corbett talked about his youth and how he was brought up around the Sydney tar ponds area. The coal industry was predominant and created a large number of jobs. However, when the industry started losing money it simply shut down operations and walked away. The government was left on the hook  for cleaning up the tar ponds.  He hopes enough safeguards are in place to prevent this sort of thing from happening in the Alberta oil sands. He does, however, believe in the  development of the  oil sands as it is  bringing so much prosperity to Canada. The rapid growth should, however, be tempered with environmental responsibility.

Corbett is a mining engineer by training and he worked with Natural Resources Canada for many years. He became heavily involved in union activities because, as he says, professionals deserve more respect in the public service. He served as a Steward, a chairperson for the Physical Sciences group and as the National Vice President.

Corbett encourages scientists, engineers and other professionals to make greater efforts to win recognition in the public sector workplace. They should get more involved with professional associations such Professional Engineers Ontario and actively promote  the causes important to them. They must resist  attempts to de-professionalize the civil service; a common tactic is to put non-professionals in a position of authority over professionals  to influence their work.

Corbett wants to provide more opportunities for career growth in the public service. That is why PIPSC  favours more action on classification of jobs so that employees can move up the ladder more easily.

Corbett hopes the economic stimulus spending will lead to more hiring of professionals, who represent the future of the public service. He is a strong defender of  public servants ,who , according to him, deserve a better public image.

He appeared on a CTV program recently where the interviewer talked about a few senior government employees who made over four or five hundred  thousand dollars a year. Corbett was quick to point out that such instances are very, very rare. Generally, the top employees in the public service make a fraction of what the private sector pays out to its CEOs. A clip from this interview can be seen at:

http://watch.ctv.ca/news/ctvs-question-period/march-15-2009/#clip150205

Corbett is currently the interim President of PIPSC; elections are due in June. If elected as the President, Corbett would like  to work hard to improve the image of public servants and to make PIPSC even more responsive to the needs of its members.