The Public Prosecution Service of Canada is defending an internal hiring process that gave priority to applicants from selected racial, disability, Indigenous and LGBTQ groups.
According to reporting by Blacklock’s Reporter, an internal call letter for an $81,000-a-year recordkeeping position at the Nunavut Regional Office said candidates who self-identified as members of specified groups would be considered “before others.”
The position involved supporting complex and high-priority cases, including homicide prosecutions and dangerous-offender applications within Nunavut’s circuit court system.
“We will consider employees who self-declare as being a Black person, a racialized person, a person living with a disability, a First Nation, an Inuit, a Métis or a member of the 2SLGBTQIA+ community for this opportunity before others,” the notice reportedly stated.
Applicants were instructed to include their self-declared identity in their résumés.
Prosecution Service spokesperson Alessia Bongiovanni denied that the preferential process violated anti-discrimination provisions in federal collective agreements.
Bongiovanni said the Employment Equity Act permits measures intended to address historical disadvantage and under-representation. She argued that workplace equality may require proactive hiring measures in addition to equal treatment.
The policy effectively placed white, heterosexual applicants without disabilities behind candidates belonging to one or more of the preferred groups.
The Treasury Board reported in July that representation of all federally designated employment-equity groups increased between 2010 and 2025.
Women now account for 59 percent of employees in the federal government’s core administration. Visible minorities comprise 24 percent, employees with disabilities nine percent and Indigenous employees 5.5 percent.
Ottawa maintains that preferential employment measures are necessary to create what it calls a “diverse and representative public service.”
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