Public Accounts Committee on Nov. 27th, 2013

[John Affleck]

Normally, on average, every year there are between 200 and 300 recalls and our samples—

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

During the time that you were conducting that audit, did any case come to your attention where a recall did not effectively and appropriately contain the food-borne illness involved?

[John Affleck]

No. The ones that we looked at were the three large meat recalls in 2012.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

You examined 59 recalls, but there were 200 or 300 recalls occurring during the time of your two-year audit and during that entire two years, you didn't hear of a single case where the food-borne illness was not effectively contained. Is that correct?

[John Affleck]

I can't speak to the recalls outside of the 59 that we examined. Of the ones that we examined, yes, it was contained.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I'm sure you would have told me if there were any others you heard about.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Mr. Woodworth, the time has expired, sir. That relative five minutes you were speaking of has arrived.

Now we go to Mr. Simms. You have the floor again, sir.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Actually, I'm going to pick up where I left off. One of the things on the online services that was mentioned earlier by Mr. Aspin on the examples of how this works, the other thing I find alarming is that we're not coordinating and talking to the provinces. They carry out the bulk of social services when needed, especially in the form of health care. Certainly when it comes to benefits such as CPP and other things, like EI, and beyond that from Service Canada, it seems to me there should be a more coordinated approach. Again you highlight only the area that talks about newborns.

Is that a model that works but nobody else is using?

[Wendy Loschiuk]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The area that we looked at, we tried to track life events and looked at how people do certain transactions to life events. Newborns came up because it was one where we have had success with the provinces.

Other than that, from what we looked at, there wasn't a whole lot of connection. I have to say that in the chapter, we focused on the federal side; we didn't go into the provinces at all to determine why there wasn't a bit more.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Certainly, you could determine that there's just no connection and coordination there whatsoever, at least no central coordination. I believe you said earlier that for several of the departments outside of the CRA, it was more of an internal measure. A best business practice is the term you used.

[Wendy Loschiuk]

That's right, it's more of a focus.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

That's certainly not client-focused. I don't want to put you in a position where you comment on policy, but nonetheless it is certainly substandard to what is considered client-focused strategy.

I want to ask a specific question. Did you come up with a number, in your investigation, where people who went to a government service in person started online and ended up going in person?

[Wendy Loschiuk]

I believe that in paragraph 2.19 we talk about the survey that Service Canada did themselves. There is that data from 2010.

From 2010 onward, I don't believe we had the exact figures to say how many people tried to start online and then ended up at a Service Canada kiosk or office, trying to work with an individual. I don't believe we tracked it exactly, from going online to being there.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Okay.

You mention in your report, sporadically, about the late 1990s. it was the GOL, the government online service, which was initiated by the government of the day. Things started to unravel, we'll say, post-2005. What was it about the GOL service that was lost following 2005?

[Michael Ferguson]

What we noted was the government online strategy was put in place and it identified 130 services to put online. That strategy ended in 2005. They were tracking the 130 services and did an assessment at the end of that. It was a specific program, with specific objectives, and it finished in 2005. After that, there was not another strategy that was put in place to determine what the objectives were going forward.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Then we go back to what you say in chapter 1, about the monitoring issues that seem to be severely lacking. It's been going on for quite some time, where we really need to do a lot of catch up on monitoring of these programs to find out if we're getting the measured success that we so desire. Certainly, when it comes to procurement, such as ship building, or even other types of equipment of that size, and the right decision about options, it seems to me that it's prolific across many departments where we lack the amount of monitoring in order to make these decisions.

[Michael Ferguson]

As I mentioned in my opening statement, a number of these issues have been around for a while. Departments have been working on them for a while, but they haven't been able to get them resolved. We think they need to go back to the things that have been proven to work in terms of setting deadlines, learning lessons, setting objectives, and those types of things in measuring performance to make sure some of these files move forward.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

We've heard of terms like Shared Services Canada, ways of improving access for the average citizen, primarily online, of course. Where has most of this gone, if we don't have the right measures in place? In other words, what are the improvements that you would see, since 2005, that are measurable? I'm not talking about specific departments; I'm just talking about methods by which we communicate with citizens, or the term that you use, which is client focus.

[Michael Ferguson]

That's what we were looking to find out. What we identified was the Canada Revenue Agency has made some progress in that area. We haven't put an inventory of all of the programs where there might have been some progress. Again, that's why the strategy is important, to set out what's expected of the departments, what applications or what services can be delivered online. Putting together that overall strategy so the departments know which applications to work on, I think is the starting point.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Thank you.

We are over, and actually well over time.

Now we'll go to Mr. Shipley. You have the floor, sir.

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

The same opportunity. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to focus on chapter 8. You say in your opening statement:

Our audit of disaster assistance to agricultural producers is an example of a program with a disconnect between the program's objective and its outcomes.

I may be reading it wrong, but I would read that this is not a program that anyone would want to template. By the way, I don't agree with that in principle or in reality, quite honestly.

I want to go to page 4, paragraph 8.7:

When federal and provincial governments agree that an AgriRecovery response is appropriate, they work together—

That means the governments, the federal, provincial, and in this case the territories, which are not too involved.

—to create an initiative. In most cases, the affected province delivers both the federal and provincial shares of funding to producers who qualify for disaster relief. The province processes applications, makes payments, and conducts post-payment audits of producers. After participating in the assessment of the event and the creation of the initiative, the federal government reimburses the province for the federal share....

In paragraph 8.1, the audit findings relate only to the department. That would be Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, as you did not audit the provincial role.

I just need to understand. If we go back to page 6, paragraph 8.15, a 45-day target, that's the assessment period. Am I hearing that this is the area of concern?

[Michael Ferguson]

The area of concern is that the goal of the AgriRecovery program is to make timely payments. What we found was in some cases, particularly in smaller payments, it was taking too long. The department was not tracking how long it was taking to make the payments, and they weren't analyzing why there would be delays.

That's why we say the program that has as its primary goal making quick payments is not structured to—

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

Would that be a joint responsibility?

[Michael Ferguson]

There's a provincial responsibility as well as a federal responsibility in this program.

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

Do we know there's a connection between the provincial and the federal in terms of that responsibility in this audit, or did we just take the one side and we don't know what the province's participation is?