Wow. Living in Ottawa, the courses are here so I didn't know that they were FLYING PEOPLE IN for the course. If the course was worthy then it would make more sense to fly the trainers OUT. I'm a systems developer for Statistics Canada. When we create a new system that is going to be used by the regions, we typically fly our testers/trainers out to the ROs. It just makes sense.
What do they cover in the course? Financial responsibilities (ie such-and-such expenditure must be approved by the director, while this-and-that must be approved by the DM)? Public Service Ethics (not allowed to accept freebies for private sector companies wishing to do business)? I know I was forced to take a useless course in financial spending to learn what I already knew - I have no authority to spend a dime of taxpayer money. But this was all part of the governments "renewing faith in the public service" program - after the Sponsorship scandal the governments brilliant plan was to spend buckets of money on useless courses and training materials to ensure that we peons don't go wasting money that we have no authority to have spent in the first place. And don't go saying that's just a typical Liberal response because the Conservatives have had plenty of time to stop this waste.
The sponsorship scandal wasted $100,000,000. The cost of Gomery was about $80,000,000. And every department is hiring more FI's (FInancial anaylists) to "ensure that government money isn't wasted". Flying people in to Ottawa for an "orientation" course is par for the course.
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