From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Ryan Thorpe 

“The government has ballooned the bureaucracy across the board, but even more concerning is that this government is swelling the ranks of its most expensive bureaucrats”

Both the number and cost of federal executives has exploded under the watch of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, according to government data and access-to-information records obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

As of 2024, there are 9,155 federal bureaucrats classified as executives by the Trudeau government, an increase of 42 per cent since 2016, when the total sat at 6,414.

“The government has ballooned the bureaucracy across the board, but even more concerning is that this government is swelling the ranks of its most expensive bureaucrats,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “Trudeau should go after the fat cats first and that means cutting back the size and cost of the federal c-suite.”

Growth has been seen among every class of executives within the federal government, with salaries  ranging from $134,827 to $255,607.

In 2022, the last year for which records are available, federal executives raked in $1.95 billion in total compensation. That represented a 41 per cent increase over 2015.

Inflation increased by 19.4 per cent between 2015 and 2022, according to Statistics Canada data.

About 90 per cent of federal executives get a bonus each year, according to records obtained by the CTF. The feds handed out $202 million in bonuses in 2022. The average bonus among executives was $18,252.

“Taxpayers are paying for more executives taking bigger salaries and bigger bonuses, but the government still can’t deliver good results,” Terrazzano said. “Can anyone in government explain why we’re paying so much for so little?”

The ballooning of the federal c-suite comes at a time when growth in the government’s bureaucracy has also been exploding.

The total size of the federal bureaucracy has grown by 42 per cent since Trudeau came to power, with more than 108,000 new bureaucrats added to the payroll.

Spending on federal bureaucrats hit a record high $67.4 billion last year, representing a 68 per cent increase in costs since 2016.

Meanwhile, spending on consultants has also reached a record high, with expenditures for 2023-24 sitting at $21.6 billion.

Despite the increased size of the bureaucracy and the federal c-suite, as well as record spending on outside consultants, departments continue to struggle to meet half of their performance targets.

In 2022-23, federal departments hit just 50 per cent of their performance targets, according to data  from the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat. Each year from 2018 through 2021, federal departments hit less than half of their performance targets.

“Less than 50 per cent of [performance] targets are consistently met within the same year,” according to a 2023 report from the Parliamentary Budget Officer, the government’s independent budget watchdog.

“Taxpayers are paying through the nose because everywhere you look the size and cost of government is ballooning,” Terrazzano said. “If any politician is serious about fixing the budget and cutting taxes, they will have to shrink Ottawa’s bloated bureaucracy.”