Thank you, Chair,
Welcome to all of our guests. We have a big crowd today.
To keep it simple, I'm going to direct my question to Ms. Cheng, and you can certainly draw in some of your colleagues as need be.
Ms. Cheng, I must admit that I came in here with some questions. Obviously we've already met with the Auditor General, and he put many of my concerns at ease. I have to admit that after listening to some of these reports today, particularly Mr. Valentini at the end, I feel much better about what I'm going to ask you about, and that is sustainability.
Major-General Millar talked about how he and the Canadian Forces welcomed the OAG report “on behalf of all members who want to ensure their pension entitlements are safe and being administered properly”. Absolutely. “It is reassuring to have the objective opinion of the OAG that these responsibilities have been appropriately performed at National Defence.”
Ms. Cheng, you went on to talk about one of your recommendations to simplify the process, consolidating the statements, which I think is a very wise idea. I come from a business background, and to see it in a more simplified consolidated form, I think, makes a lot of sense.
As we talk about sustainability, one of the concerns that came out after the report was issued is that members of the media and the opposition were reporting that the audit had concluded that the public sector pension plans were not sustainable. In today's reports, in the OAG report, under the scope of the actual audit, you talk about the fact that you didn't audit sustainability. In fact, your reference to that is the following:
The audit did not assess the sustainability of the pension plans. The audit did not examine the administrative processes, investment practices, and actuarial methods for valuation calculations.
I'm confused. The media and the opposition have one opinion on the sustainability of these very important programs—these plans. We want to see these plans sustainable for the long term, and Mr. Valentini, with a compounded return of some 6% plus annually, gives me good reason to believe we've achieved that.
I wonder if you could explain where I'm missing it. How does the non-sustainability square with sustainability, when I'm hearing these reports today?