Canadian government needs an overhaul of its procurement and partnering frameworks to more effectively support intergovernmental arrangements and deliver more public value, according to a new research report.
Transformational government - or the notion of cross-jurisdictional and citizen-friendly service delivery - requires a mix of partnering models, new methodologies and tools, asserts the Crossing Boundaries National Council, an Ottawa-based think tank co-chaired by Rona Ambrose, federal minister of intergovernmental affairs.
Crossing Boundaries drew up its latest report with consulting firms CGI, Accenture and EDS Canada, after a survey of over 1,200 senior officials at the federal, provincial and municipal levels, as well as a country-wide series of roundtable discussions.
The report says Canadian government, particularly the Feds, is lagging behind other Commonwealth countries and the United States in the development and use of partnering arrangements to meet citizens' expectations and to deliver services across all three levels of government.
"Unless we formalize some of these cross-jurisdictional procedures and methodologies, we'll be living in a very stovepiped world for much longer," says Andy Blenkarn, one of the report's co-authors.
Canadian governments remain siloed in their service delivery areas and are only beginning to "join up" their services and programs, the report notes.
Outside of a few leading examples -- such as the BizPal licensing application and the B.C. government's model of alternative service delivery -- governments tend to employ traditional procurement processes that are not delivering timely, cost-effective results.
These procurement processes are also not enabling innovative partnering arrangements but are inhibiting them, the report asserts.
By focusing more on outcomes, the study concludes that partnering arrangements could play a more significant part in building governments' capacity for service delivery and attracting investment and innovation.
Partnering arrangements and the evolution of change are painfully slow in Canada, adds Blenkarn, a vice-president at EDS Canada.
"The principles and frameworks are not in place here in Canada to enable strong government-to-government and government-to-industry partnering arrangements," he says.
"When I look at the size, speed and transformational capacity of the U.K. government [as only one example], it's because they more readily embrace partnering arrangements.
"Canada needs a new framework that is more outcomes-based, one that is led by progressive governance and a set of key policies and practices around partnering."
Partnering agreements and charters are relatively new in Canada, according to the study, and few government organizations have adopted standardized approaches and tools to support effective partnering arrangements.
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