In the 1980’s and early ‘90’s, the Treasury Board-sponsored Interdepartmental Quality Network (IQN) was active with regular meetings and ‘phone-in capabilities for those outside the NCR to meet, listen to quality-related presentations and share quality experiences.  While active meeting were held in Ottawa, other interested quality professionals were able to be connected to the meetings by teleconference with callers located in Belleville, Montreal, Moncton and other centres.

After a period of time, the TBS would no longer host the IQN and it was decided that the Canadian Public Sector Quality Association should be formed to continue to provide a focus for public sector quality.

The Association was established in 1996 as an independent, not-for-profit organization managed by a number of dedicated volunteers from the federal, provincial/territorial, municipal and the broader public sectors. There was no sponsor to provide funding support and thus the Association had to rely on in-kind support from a variety of sources. Two very successful conferences were held and the revenue from these events, to this day, have provided some ongoing support for CPSQA activities.

Organizations such as Health Canada, the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General, the Canadian General Standards Board and others provided free meeting space for CPSQA. Much of the meeting support was provided by the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General at the Provincial Courthouse in Ottawa making use of the Marriage Preparation Room until that space became unavailable due to other demands for its use.

Unfortunately, there was no opportunity provided for those public sector employees outside the NCR to participate in the meetings by telephone and as a result, CPSQA became very much a National Capital Region resource with no opportunity to serve public sector employees outside the NCR.

With the return of the Ottawa Public Sector Quality Fairs in 2007, modest funding has been made available with any net revenue available being divided between the co-hosts CPSQA and NQI.