Starting in July, Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) will begin generating reports on each employee to monitor compliance with the three-day minimum in-office rule.

While the department previously collected aggregated data on logins, it will now track individual employee activity. The new report, called the Low Onsite Connectivity Report, will track logins, vacations, flexible hours, and holidays. The reports will be sent to managers, who will be able to contact employees who have not met the requirements to find out why.

If there is no valid reason, administrative or disciplinary action may be taken.

Internal documents showed that as of September 2024, only 73% of employees were complying with the new rules. The HR department had particularly low attendance, at 67%.

ESDC said it had conducted a privacy impact assessment and consulted with the Privacy Commissioner.

The Treasury Secretariat confirmed that the initiative came from ESDC and that heads of departments were themselves responsible for monitoring staff attendance.