Canada Post's role in remote communities discussed at Yellowknife consultations

Not one ordinary Joe showed up to listen to a panel of northerners' concerns and ideas on the future of Canada Post. But that didn't hinder the two-hour consultation.

Pre-registered panellists from the Northern Territories Federation of Labour, the City of Yellowknife, the Legislative Assembly, the N.W.T. Association of Communities and the Yellowknife local for the Canadian Union of Postal Workers took turns making a five-minute pitch to a committee made up of 10 MPs.

There was also time for MPs to ask questions to the panellists.

A lot of talk was on how to make Canada Post a revenue-generating business.

Lynda Lefrancois, president of the Yellowknife local for the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, says that with the shift to email rather than paper mail, "what we have to do is generate more revenue to be able to self-sustain us here in the North."

Lefrancois told the committee that Canada Post needs to provide other services such as postal banking because some Northern communities don't have a bank. That would mean "being able to just go in, pay your bills at the post office, being able to transfer money to different people," she said.

"In a lot of the communities there are no government offices — we're talking about the much smaller communities in the North — so when they have to do something, [such as] they have to do identity verification, the post office can do it."

She also raised the idea of bringing back the food mail program that was replaced with Nutrition North in 2011.

Lefrancois has been working in the postal industry for 22 years.

"I wanted them to hear, as the employee, what it is that we want to see," she said.

"There should be a combined effort between the employees and the employer, the corporation, to generate the ideas, to generate and work together to find solutions that do exist." 

Collaborative effort

Brenda Shanahan, an MP from Quebec, is a member of the committee.

"I really enjoyed hearing the suggestions about how Canada Post could be working at a more collaborative way not only with the communities but with the employees and with the citizens that receive their services," she said.

"I think we could learn a lot from how governance is done here in the Northwest Territories.

"I think there's no doubt, everyone is aware is that there are challenges with how Canada Post is going to operate in the future. If we had that good will and people working together, I think that's going to go a long way."

Yasmin Ratanasi, an MP from Toronto and vice-chair of the committee, said the speakers offered "a breath of fresh air" and laid out some of the practical issues northerners face. 

"I don't think Canadians in the south realize the challenges of the North and how to keep those communities viable both socially, economically and mentally."

Even though Yellowknifers opted not to stand in a line-up this morning and be frisked by security guards with metal detectors to listen in on the future of Canada Post, anyone can fill out the committee's online survey until Oct. 21.

The study and consultation will be published in a report and presented in the House of Commons in December.