Yes.
Evidence of meeting #70 for Public Accounts in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was service.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #70 for Public Accounts in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was service.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
—and invite your officials to come to the clinic, and at that clinic you would verify that the application was completed correctly.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
Would the response time be quicker as a result of that clinic having been held?
4:55 p.m.
Acting Director General, Security Bureau, Passport Canada
It would be quicker in that there is less chance of the application being rejected, and the benefit to the applicants is that they would be able to retain their birth certificate or their citizenship certificate.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
Right. They wouldn't have to send it away.
How big a problem is the rejection?
4:55 p.m.
Acting Director General, Security Bureau, Passport Canada
It's an enormous problem. In mail-in applications from the United States right now, about 40% of the applications are being rejected because of problems with the documentation, the form, or the photos. Domestically, it's slightly less, but not much; 25% to 30% of mail-in applications are currently rejected.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
When do you expect the big peak to arise again? You mentioned it earlier.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
4:55 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Passport Canada
We are more or less at the same level as in January, so it's really difficult to foresee, but the peak season normally would be from the end of November to March.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
If one were to hold one of these clinics, that might be a good time, or in the lead-up to that period.
4:55 p.m.
Acting Director General, Security Bureau, Passport Canada
Right. We're putting together a plan now for clinics across the country with agencies that have requested that we do that—for example, the duty free shop in Sarnia, or with various members of Parliament who have asked that we conduct them. You can contact us for our availability to do that.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
Okay. That's great.
Can you give us some security breach scenarios that you hear the most in your work? Give us some very practical examples that trouble you the most and that we must shield ourselves against.
4:55 p.m.
Acting Director General, Security Bureau, Passport Canada
A worldwide problem is that as the documents themselves become more secure and are more difficult to replicate or tamper with, internal fraud becomes the biggest problem. We have significant controls in our organization to prevent and catch internal fraud—
4:55 p.m.
Liberal
4:55 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I want to pick up on a comment of Mr. Roy about Service Canada. I want to support his point. I wasn't overly impressed to hear that they are the backstop for no passport offices. I'm having tremendous problems with Service Canada in my riding. They've centralized, they've generalized, and for the most part, unless you go in with an absolutely perfect whatever, they aren't in a position to give you the details you need. I'm certain that would apply to passports too.
I've got to tell you that from a Hamilton perspective, telling me that Service Canada is going to be there.... Although we have a passport office, nonetheless I've got to get that in there about Service Canada. The government should stop thinking they can keep pointing to Service Canada and saying that's where everything's going to be, because it's not working, and it's going to be a problem if you don't fix it.
Also, there was a question from Mr. McGuinty about, if I understood correctly, cost recovery. He asked if there is 100% cost recovery, and I believe the answer from Mr. Cossette or Mr. Edwards was yes. The Auditor General's report says on page 4, section 5.8:
Passport Canada and Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada did not apply the regulations for ongoing consultation on service standards and how they relate to passport and consular fees. Passport Canada was not ready to carry out the new legislation on user fees because it lacked reliable information on the true cost of services.
I would assume from the “yes” answer that this has been overcome, that you've got that breakdown, and that's why you answered in the affirmative. Is that correct?
5 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade
Yes, it is correct.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Okay. Cool.
My last question would be on the western hemisphere travel initiative. I just want you to comment on this. Just today—this morning, a little while ago—the Auditor General said in her opening remarks:
However, we looked at how Passport Canada was preparing for this initiative and expressed concern as to whether it was prepared to successfully deal with the potential increase in demand.
I've heard a lot of things, but I still haven't heard you come right out and say you don't have that concern or that there's no need for a concern or that everything's fine. So tell me again why we shouldn't put so much emphasis on paragraph 8 of the Auditor General's opening remarks, because what I read there is worrisome.
5 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Passport Canada
What we are doing now is working toward increasing our capacity so that we can meet the demand as the demand arises.
Part of the problem with the demand is the confusion surrounding the final implementation date of the WHTI. Will people come in November instead of May? Will people come in September instead of December? It's very difficult to judge, but we're building our capacity so that in November we should be in a much better position to answer the demand, and I'm talking about a surge in demand; I'm not talking about basically the same level we had last year, but an increase over the record year we had last year.
5 p.m.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Madam Fraser, you heard the answer to the point you made an hour ago. Does that satisfy you?
5 p.m.
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
The issue we raised in this report, Mr. Chair, was that the local offices didn't have contingency plans in place as to how they would cope. We would expect that plans should be there, and I don't know if they are or not.
5 p.m.
Acting Director General, Security Bureau, Passport Canada
The local offices all now have business continuity plans. As an example, the Harry Hays Building in Calgary was recently shut down. We were able to divert services to Calgary and Edmonton because we had a particular problem there. When we have localized increases in volume, yes, we have plans in place.
We are acquiring additional space wherever we can so that people will not be waiting outside in the elements. We have put specific practices in place. Dealing with the lineups in Vancouver is different from dealing with lineups in Toronto, because you can't wait inside the building in Vancouver. Wherever we can, we have very specific plans for each office. The office managers have been fully engaged in doing this and are sharing those practices, and we are staffing as much as we can by extending hours and putting night shifts in place.
