Information & Ethics committee  We expect the departments to reallocate, within their own institutions, the resources to implement the policies, and that's one of the reasons why this is a plan over five years. The implementation of this change will take time because we don't have any additional funding.

Information & Ethics committee  We're waiting for that to balance out. So the benefits of better information management will offset the necessary investment to introduce this better information management. However, it is up to each of the departments to find the internal resources to carry out this implementation.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, exactly.

Information & Ethics committee  Personally, I believe that the departments will take this directive seriously. There are benefits in better managing information, and they will make the necessary investments. If not, we'll know it through our assessment process.

Information & Ethics committee  Certainly. Area of management number 12 is effectiveness of information management. There are 19 areas of management. Each area of management has what we call lines of evidence—we try to do evidence-based decision-making and evaluation, in this context. Until this round of the management accountability framework, there were only four.

Information & Ethics committee  Those documents exist. So we should be able to provide them to you soon.

Information & Ethics committee  What are the typical requirements? One or two weeks?

Information & Ethics committee  One consequence can be to require a department to take certain measures. That could be to request a program audit or evaluation. It could even be measures that are not included in the Financial Administration Act. It could mean managing a department's funds until it has corrected certain deficiencies in its programs.

Information & Ethics committee  Not in an information management context, but in other contexts.

Information & Ethics committee  It's impossible for me to give you a specific example.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes.

Information & Ethics committee  When a department receives an audit request from the Treasury Board under the Financial Administration Act, I believe that it is a consequence. Going even further by managing a department's funds is quite a harsh consequence.

Information & Ethics committee  We also acknowledge the challenge of having competent people in place, and that's a recruitment, development and training issue. There is an organization that helps us collectively recruit information management specialists within the public service. Under the Information Management Policy, the express role of the Canada School of Public Service is to provide that training, and we are working in close cooperation with the school, Library and Archives Canada, and the Treasury Board Secretariat to ensure that the content of those programs is up to date.

Information & Ethics committee  No.

Information & Ethics committee  We have a governance structure that gets many of these senior management officials together about every two months to discuss some of the key issues. It's our committee on information management in business. It also combines senior access to information officials to reinforce that linkage between information management and access to information.