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Around 600 temporary employees of the Canada Revenue Agency will see their contracts canceled before Christmas.

The CRA confirmed to the Ottawa Citizen on Friday that workers will be laid off early as part of the federal government’s spending review.

Marc Brière, national president of the Union of Taxation Employees, said the CRA informed the union of the cuts at a meeting Tuesday and that some employees’ contracts would end as early as Nov. 29. 13. He said the contracts of some of these employees were supposed to run until the end of March 2025.

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“A lot of people burst into tears at the scene yesterday, there were a lot of people who were in distress and they were in shock to hear this,” Brière said. “The employees will be gone but the workload will remain. »

Employees were notified Thursday and Friday, Brière said, noting that there appear to be more than 600 people affected, despite the number reported by the CRA.

Brière said 272 of the laid-off workers are in Western Canada, 154 in Ontario and between 140 and 180 in Atlantic Canada. In Quebec, 96 employees will see their contracts terminated early, including 15 in Gatineau.

Most of the laid-off workers are debt collectors. But some listeners are also being laid off, Brière said.

“I don’t understand why the CRA is targeting collection and verification when it’s your livelihood,” Brière said, adding that the government spent unnecessary funds to bring workers back to the office.

At this point, Brière said the CRA does not plan to cut any permanent positions. There are also no plans to make further reductions in 2024.

“I’m sure that in 2025, I don’t know when or what time, but there will be some at some point, that’s for sure,” Brière said, emphasizing that the ARC would not guarantee that it there would be no cuts, only that they were not expected in the coming months. “A lot of people are very nervous, even permanent employees.”

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The federal government has given departments and agencies until November 20 to reduce their budgets as part of a spending review. Last week, the government met with the unions to let them know that term-term and permanent layoffs of employees may be considered.

Nina Ioussoupova, an agency spokeswoman, said the ARC “does not make these decisions lightly” and continues to analyze “how to manage our operations within our approved budget while limiting the impacts on human resources”.

“There is no easy way to share this news, and we recognize that it can cause stress, especially as the end of the year approaches,” Yussoupova said.

By 2024, the ARC had 59,155 employees, compared to 40,059 in 2015. Brière said approximately 12,000 term employees work at the CRA.

Debt collectors, who make up the bulk of the layoffs, bring in between one and five million dollars a year, Briere said. Their maximum salary is between $65,000 and $73,000.

This is not the first time this year that cuts have taken place at the CRA. In May, the agency announced that it would not extend contracts for 2,000 call center employees across the country.

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In an internal memo last week, CRA Commissioner Bob Hamilton and Deputy Commissioner Jean-François Fortin said “a period of financial constraints” meant the agency would cease permanent promotions and appointments new students.

The memo also said there would be a “freeze on non-critical overtime” and “an expectation that all employees take their vacation and compensatory time off in the year in which it is earned.” Hamilton and Fortin added that some branches and regions may have taken other measures to control spending, such as reducing travel, training and consultant contracts.

“Additional measures may be necessary, both at the national and branch/regional levels, as this is an evolving situation,” the memo said.

Brière said the current cuts represent “unnecessary personal tragedies for people before Christmas”.

“This is bad news and this is probably just the beginning of more bad news coming to the government,” Brière said.

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