With respect to the other study of the Auditor General, you should have in front of you a short deck. I'll just walk through it. It basically summarizes what we have done so far since the November report was tabled.
May I say, just from the outset, that I'd like to thank the committee for inviting us, but as well to say that anyone in the government who manages programs always welcomes the opportunity to have the dialogue we have with the Auditor General as well as our internal evaluators and auditors so that we can improve the program delivery.
The report is only about 30 weeks ago, but I still think we've made tremendous progress in improving it. In fact, it confirms
a number of the conclusions to which I myself came when I accepted the position of Assistant Deputy Minister for Cultural Affairs in September 2004. Moreover, I believe that the Auditor General clearly stated in paragraph 5.18 that she had noted a change in direction in November 2004, shortly after I arrived at the department. That's a good sign. However, we're still making progress in that area.
In the presentation, we'll try to divide the Auditor General's recommendations and to update progress being made on implementing them.
You'll note that it's obviously not a completed job. It's only been some 30 weeks, but it's always a work in progress. We're always trying to redefine the environment changes, and the needs of the cultural industries change as well.
I can tell you, for instance, that on page 2 of the presentation, the suggestion was that we needed to do stronger horizontal management in my sector, which has about 300 employees and numerous programs. I have a group that reports directly through me, which is responsible for strategic policy and planning. As a result, I'm able to have a direct influence on making sure that we have that horizontal approach. I've created research tables that are horizontal, as well as results tables, HR tables, and a task force on the impact of new technologies on the cultural sector more generally.
Since the Auditor General's report was issued, I also effected a reorganization, and my colleague here was appointed director general of cultural industries in a single place. Beforehand, cultural industries were divided up into several places with different accountabilities. This will bring stronger horizontality.
On page 3 there were comments about governance and governance framework. I can report that since the Auditor General's report, there have been developments concerning the Canadian Television Fund. As of March 1, we implemented the new structure, which had been announced by former Minister Frulla about a year ago. Everyone at Telefilm, in the department, and at the CTF worked diligently to implement a simpler, more aligned structure to deliver the CTF program.
I'm happy to report that the transition costs for the new structure came in at some $300,000 below budget, and on a going-forward basis we will be saving about $3 million annually, which can be redirected towards production financing, as a result of the realignment.
I can also tell you that the administration costs have gone down from an average of 5.8% to 5.1% over that period of time. Although we had seen this issue, the Auditor General noted that we could do better. We've implemented a plan to get better results for Canadians.
Maybe I'll ask Jean-François to speak to pages 4 and 5.