Government Operations Committee on Nov. 27th, 2012

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Can you provide the committee with a breakdown, year after year, by program activity, of the budget estimates in relation to the department's actual spending? Could you clearly indicate where the reductions have been applied and provide a list of any frozen allotments related to the successive cuts?

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

You have only a few seconds to answer the question, but you're welcome to try.

[Andrew Treusch]

We're happy to comply to any requests the committee makes. I know a member of the committee made such a request for this meeting, and we're quite prepared to respond to that in written form, which I think would largely satisfy. It does not deal with individual person movements, but we're happy to provide additional information in aggregate on the FTEs and the impacts of DRAP.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

I wonder if that could be done through the clerk, and then it could be distributed to committee members.

[Andrew Treusch]

If it's the will of the committee, certainly.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

That would be good. Thank you.

For the Conservatives, Mike Wallace.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our guests for being here today.

I really appreciate the associate deputy minister's explanation of how things actually work, where the direction is given to the departments on what numbers we need to achieve, but it's the departments who make the recommendations to the minister, he or she, on what programs need to change, where there are savings possibilities, and they bring that to cabinet for approval. It's not a top-down approach, but the management of government that brings forward the concept, the idea, as we set the direction. I really appreciate that explanation, which I've used many times at public meetings in my own riding.

I have a question about the actual estimates book that we have. Shared Services Canada is new; it keeps getting transfers from all the departments to fund it. Should I anticipate that this will continue, or are they getting their own money and the transfers will stop from departments? Are we going to still allocate it to departments for them to transfer over to Shared Services through these books, or will they get their own funding line?

[Andrew Treusch]

I will ask Alex to help me in replying.

Overall, Shared Services Canada gathered people and their base budget from some 43 or 44 departments, importantly, from Public Works. I believe initially, and it is shown in our documentation to Parliament, some 1,100 people were moved from Public Works to become the core of the new Shared Services Canada. That also involved a transfer of moneys as well.

Those have taken place already. Shared Services Canada is up and running effectively. It's operating as a separate entity within our portfolio, reporting to our minister. There will be, I'm sure, still some minor adjustments around the edges, but fundamentally it's there and in place.

I would add that Shared Services Canada will operate not unlike Public Works and Government Services Canada, in that some of their services will be provided on a cost-recovery basis to departments. So they will cost-recover some of their undertakings.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Will they have their own names? Will they have their own grouping?

[Alex Lakroni]

The answer is yes. I don't want to speak for Shared Services Canada, but my understanding is that it's out there. It's a department on its own, with all the authorities, and that means the estimates, supplementary estimates, public accounts, DPR, RPP, etc.

In terms of the second half of your question, regarding transfers from departments and whether that will end or not, I think the essence of the transfers occurred last year, so it's in their main estimates. As Mr. Treusch mentioned, there may be some adjustments down the road for departments that have certain negotiations in terms of resources being transferred. We know that Shared Services Canada will operate on a cost-recovery basis, so you will see departments paying fees to Shared Services Canada for services consumed, but we're not going to see the magnitude of transfers we saw last year.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you.

I'm going to do a little comparison of your PRs, your performance reports, and what you actually spent in 2011-12, based on the report I have in front of me, what your forecast spending was, and then what your planned spending is based on your plans and priorities document that you provided in March.

The one question I have for you that pops out is on linguistic management services. You guesstimated that you were going to spend.... You forecast $78 million. You came in at $74 million. Then in 2012-13 it pops up to $80 million, and then in 2013-14 it pops down to $65 million.

Can you explain why?

[Andrew Treusch]

I won't address the numbers, but I certainly can.... Forecasting translation demand is a bit like forecasting the weather, quite frankly. It's a demand-driven program, and you would know this as a parliamentarian. We're not really able to forecast when Parliament will sit, how many days it will sit, and how long the meetings will be. We're not always able to forecast with great accuracy the foreign delegations—

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I understand that, but why then...? There's a significant change between planned spending for 2012-13—from $80 million down to $65 million in 2013-14. Are you doing something differently in terms of the program? The rest is about $74 million, $78 million, $80 million—it's all in the same ballpark—and then it drops relatively significantly. Then it drops again the next year, another $7 million.

Are you doing a new program? Are you doing something differently?

[Andrew Treusch]

No. That's an excellent question.

You're turning to 2012-13 over 2011-12 there?

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

So for 2011-12, which is actually in the bank, you spent $74 million. You forecasted $78 million. Then it goes up slightly for 2012-13 to $80 million. It's on page 10 of your plans and priorities document. But then there's a decrease from $80 million to $65 million, and then it goes down to $59 million.

Is something happening in linguistic services? Is there more computer-generated output? What's happening? Why the difference?

[Andrew Treusch]

I believe there are two factors there. First, there had been a program that was delivered through the Translation Bureau where scholarships and bursaries were provided. That program sunsetted and has ended. That accounts for the decline there.

Second, beyond Parliament, we are providing services to individual departments. They have an option to contract out translation services. We are finding that an increasing number of departments are using this alternative for their less sensitive translation services.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

You are over seven minutes already there, Mike, which is some kind of a record almost, actually. I've let you go over longer than anybody ever before.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

I'll thank you all if I get another chance.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

You'll have to wait for next time.

We'll go to Kelly Block, please.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd also like to thank our guests for being here today. I'm very pleased to have you here to testify before our committee.

I want to start by congratulating you on receiving—I'm going to go back to your notes—the 2012 public service award of excellence and the 2012 bronze award for innovative management from the Institute of Public Administration, as well as on being named both one of the national capital region's top employers and one of Canada's best diversity employers. I think this is something to celebrate, and I just wanted to repeat those accomplishments and get them on the record again.

You also said in your notes that PWGSC has shown leadership in the area of sound financial management and has instilled a culture of budget management excellence throughout the various program branches.

Earlier you talked a little bit about the department-wide client service strategy. I'm wondering if you could tell me a little bit more about that, because it is aimed at bringing a consistent and disciplined approach to the provision of services. How many client departments are there? Tell me a little bit more about that strategy.

[Andrew Treusch]

Thank you very much for the kind remarks. They're much appreciated.

Thank you as well for the question.

Our department sees itself mainly as a service department, as a backbone for the Government of Canada. We serve literally all the departments, large and small, across the Government of Canada. Counting some of the small entities can be a bit of a chore, but you're talking about probably 125 or so, plus or minus 10, and we serve them all.

We have probably over 30 main business lines. We're known for real property, and we're known for acquisition, but we have over 30 different business lines across the government. Since we depend upon these departments, it's important to us that we put in place a very strong client service strategy. It starts with having service standards. We've set for ourselves client service standards that we can be measured against. We've done that for two years now, and in our second year we're able to report not just on the standards but on our results against the standards. We reset the standards. In the vast majority of cases, we've raised the bar; we've increased the standards. That's the core of it.

We have a whole new generation of service agreements with our client departments, so they know our expectations. That's another key piece.

We're renewing our competencies so that when we staff, we put client service at the heart of our staffing function. We're training our employees in client service, and we have a barometer; we have a way of gauging the relationship we have and the satisfaction of our clients.

We have a pretty comprehensive client strategy, and we're quite proud of it.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

Thank you.

I have two minutes. I don't know that I'm going to take all of that up.

You also noted in your opening remarks that PWGSC has had very good results in the annual management accountability framework assessments, and you said those were carried out by the Treasury Board portfolio. Can you explain that for me? Is that someone independent from your department? Who actually conducts those assessments?

[Andrew Treusch]

For organizations, probably the most comprehensive assessment of the quality of management of a department is these annual assessments by the Treasury Board Secretariat. So they are indeed done externally. They have a set of indicators—and I've lost count, but there might be 80 or 90 separate indicators, with a lot of documentation, quite frankly—that they ask of us. They rate us on all of the areas that constitute good management practices, and they do that each year. That report is publicly available. It's posted on the website of the Treasury Board Secretariat.

When I say the Treasury Board Secretariat, I should elaborate. That includes their human resources people. They're actually reviewing the way we manage our human resource responsibilities. As well, the Comptroller General looks more at the handiwork of my colleague Alex in terms of rigorous financial management. It's quite comprehensive, and those reports are publicly posted.

Three or four years ago we were not in such a great place. We had a lot of areas for improvement, as it would say on my report card when I went to school. So we've been very focused on improving our performance, and we've had good results.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

Thank you, Kelly. That does use up your time.

We're going to Denis Blanchette.

[Denis Blanchette, NDP, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our guests for being with us this morning.

A little earlier, in response to a question from my colleague, you said you had a proposal of your own with a view to contributing to deficit reduction and the strategic review.

Since the government asks you to make efforts year after year and is going to ask you to do so next year, I wonder whether you have an overall plan for a certain number of years with a view to coping with these requests.

I also wonder why this element, which, it must be said, gives rise to major costs and mobilizes a lot of resources on the part of your department, is not in itself an element in the 2012–13 Report on Plans and Priorities. It seems to me that the scope of government requests would justify the existence of a special section in this report.