Public Accounts Committee on Oct. 31st, 2011

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Until time has expired.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Oh, until the time has expired for today.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Yes, correct.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Very well.

Okay, you've heard the amendment. The amendment is now debatable.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I heard the amendment, and I understand the consequences of the amendment, so a question to you, Mr. Chairman, is what is the time per intervention? Is it still five minutes, or are you down to two minutes so that all parties can have a crack at it?

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

The amendment, as I'm taking it, is that we would do the regular routes of procedure, so we would repeat, and it would be five minutes.

Is there anything further on the amendment?

(Amendment agreed to)

On the main motion as amended, the floor is open for debate.

(Motion as amended agreed to)

The motion is carried and so ordered. We'll begin another rotation.

Therefore, Mr. Saxton, you now have the floor, sir, for five minutes.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, I want to say that today is the first time I've met Mr. Ferguson. It's the first time I have had a chance to talk with him, both in English as well as French, and as somebody who has learned French—an anglophone myself—I can tell you that Mr. Ferguson definitely is not a beginner.

I am very impressed with your progress to date, and in fact I am quite surprised at your progress to date. If this continues, I have no doubt you will very soon be very conversant in the French language.

Now I would like to read a quote to the committee, which I have in front of me:

But however stern he might be, he was always fair and always principled. And you can't argue with his main message to any government of the day - that government must be as open and transparent as possible when dealing with taxpayers' money.

Mr. Chair, this is a quote from the New Brunswick Liberal leader, Victor Boudreau, and he is of course referring to our nominated candidate for Auditor General, Mr. Ferguson.

This is yet another of the long list of testimonials of people, from all different parties, who have worked with Mr. Ferguson and who have glowing things to say about him.

Earlier, my colleague, Mr. Warawa, also started to go through the long list of criteria for this position, and it became very clear and evident that Mr. Ferguson qualifies under all of the criteria. The one issue is regarding his language proficiency, and I think that has been already dealt with ad nauseam today.

Mr. Ferguson, during your time as Auditor General of New Brunswick, you ran an office of 22 people, with an annual budget of $1.8 million. Can you please elaborate on how you increased your individual productivity to add value to the taxpayers of New Brunswick?

[Michael Ferguson]

With that small of an office, in terms of the number of people and dollars, we had to be very strategic in how we selected audits. We had to be very strategic in how we scoped the audits because the danger was that we could use up all of our performance auditors on one audit that would take 18 months and then we would have nothing to report to the legislature.

We had to be very thorough and diligent in terms of selecting what audits needed to be done, in assigning people to those audits, in scoping the audits appropriately, and then in producing a report. I think we produced about four performance audits a year.

I'm very proud of the productivity we had when you compare it to the inputs we had, and I'm also very proud of the outcomes and the recommendations we made in those reports. We very much were “to the bone”, and I think we managed that very well.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you.

You've served in the New Brunswick provincial government since 1985, I believe. How will you interweave your vast amount of technical knowledge with the soft skills you've acquired over the years to ensure effectiveness as the Auditor General of Canada?

[Michael Ferguson]

As I've said a number of times, auditing is a rigorous process. It seems in a lot of situations to be a mechanical process. But at the heart of the success of any audit organization are the people. It is extremely important to build an environment for the people in the office so they can succeed.

One thing I have been very proud of in my career is the many people who have appreciated the way I've supported them or the environment I've given them to work in so they can succeed. Fundamentally, one of the most important things in making an audit office successful is giving people the environment they can flourish in, they can succeed in, they're respected in, and that helps them reach their aspirations.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Very good. Thank you, Mr. Saxton.

We now have Monsieur Caron.

You have the floor, sir.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you very much.

I would like to come back to the question I asked earlier when I quoted what was on the website of the Progressive Conservative Party of New Brunswick. You said that you did not remember what you said. I'm willing to accept that.

But the quote itself isn't necessarily about taxes. It's not about whether people should pay more or less tax or if taxes should be higher or lower, but rather about the role. When you were the auditor general of New Brunswick, were you responsible for commenting on the government's fiscal policy? Was that part of your responsibilities as auditor general?

[Michael Ferguson]

No, as a rule we stayed away from policy discussions. If we were doing an audit, auditing the government's compliance with the policy, and found that the government was not complying with the policy, we would make a recommendation that the government either comply with the policy, since it was in place, or change the policy, but we wouldn't say to what the policy should be changed.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

This is your understanding of what your mandate or your role as Auditor General of Canada should be?

[Michael Ferguson]

That's right.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

What you said, or what was reported on the website of the New Brunswick Progressive Conservative Party as being statements you made, does not necessarily represent a philosophy that you would agree with as auditor general because this is specifically about fiscal policies.

Do you want me to read it again?

[Michael Ferguson]

No, I heard it.

As Auditor General I very much believe that a government needs to live within its means and be able to afford the programs it is paying for. The reason is that it's fundamentally important to make the social programs that the citizens of the country need sustainable.

On how tax policy fits into something like that, it's just one piece of a number of policies. But my fundamental umbrella belief is that a government needs to figure out how to live within its means so that it is not incurring debt to pay for services it's delivering today.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

So you are talking about a general philosophy, but not necessarily about specific comments by the auditor general on fiscal policies. We need to control public spending and I think that everyone agrees that it needs to be done in a sustainable way. But it's not the auditor general's role to take a position on debates about the government's fiscal policies.

[Michael Ferguson]

That's right.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Okay.

I have one last quick question, if I may.

The previous Auditor General, Ms. Fraser, had a key project—I think the committee members will acknowledge this—which was to look into the particular issue of the first nations, a problematic situation that unfortunately continues. Do you yourself have a key project that you would like to focus on in the next 10 years?

[Michael Ferguson]

That would be something where I would work with the office as a whole, to determine the right priorities for the office to look into. So I'm not going to go in with any preconceived notions saying, “This is what we're going to look at.” I would work together with the whole team to determine what our priorities should be.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you.

Do I have any time left?

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

You still have 30 seconds.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I'll let the remaining 30 seconds go.