Environment Committee on April 1st, 2010

[Scott Vaughan]

What I will say about this—and I will ask my colleague Mr. Sloan about this—is that the OAG lives by “plan, do, check, improve”. It's a core function of what we view as good management systems.

If I may just respond to the second question, the addition of the expenditure management systems, as well as the reporting through the reports on plans and priorities, is a potentially interesting and important step. We would have to look at the level of detail and clarity, but on first blush, it looks like it could potentially be an important step.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

You've used the words “interesting” and “important”. Can I put it in more positive terms that it would be a good thing?

[Scott Vaughan]

Well, we have to wait for...the clock is ticking and that's why I would....

If we get invited back when we have finished our review, I'll be able to say whether it's good or bad.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Speaking of the clock ticking, your time has run out.

Going into our five-minute round, Mr. Trudeau can kick us off.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you for that, but Mr. Woodworth brings up a good point. I think it would be important, first of all, that you come back once you've finished your analysis of this. I'm always pleased to see you, Commissioner Vaughan, but I say so while wishing that we had a little more meat to discuss and you were a little further along in your discussion of it. I think Mr. Woodworth highlights, and legitimately so, that governments of the past have not always been able to deliver on their visions and on what people had hoped to achieve.

In terms of achievements since 2005, I just wonder if there have been concrete improvements and real changes in what the government has been doing, other than it proposing new plans. In looking at some of the things the government has brought forward with much trumpeting, I think exactly of the changes it has made to environmental assessments. These have purportedly been made to simplify and eliminate red tape and duplication. Is that going to help the federal government become more sustainable in the long run or not?

[Scott Vaughan]

First of all, let me say that I wish we could have given you more today. So we'd be keen to come back. We're always glad to be here, actually.

In terms of whether there have been concrete improvements in the timeline from 2007, tabled late in 2008 but tabled actually in 2009, the answer is no. We've repeated the point that strategies were not working and needed to be fixed. I think Parliament took that, and this is the new act, and we're looking forward to it.

Your final question was whether this was going to make Canada or the federal government and its direction more sustainable. To me that is the question. It's why this is so important, because these are substantive and difficult issues, and it's why we would like to take the time to go and see, from what's there, what are the signals, or at least what are the preliminary steps in that direction.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

In your initial overview...and one of the questions we had last week in initially looking at this was about the mechanisms. The idea of a federal sustainable strategy is to make sure that every department and ministry is focused on the environment, that it not just be the purview of the environment ministry but that everyone take a role in sustainability for the federal government.

What sorts of mechanisms are going to be in place to make sure that the decisions that industry and the Ministry of Finance make are actually going to have the political leverage to act in ways that are good for the environment, as importantly as they would be good for finance, or industry, or everything else?

[Scott Vaughan]

The strategy we'll come back to, but I think there are already tools there. There are tools...for example, the cabinet directive on strategic environmental assessment, the whole purpose of which is to ask, on plans or programs that are not overtly stated to deal with the environment, do they have environmental implications? This we view as being an important, critical tool. We've also found and reported to Parliament that those tools were not being implemented fully; their potential was not being realized.

So there are different tools that exist to look at agricultural policy, energy policies, transport policies, and others, as well as from the other side, to look at the environmental assessment process, and we view those tools as being part of the package.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

It's the idea that we've put forward, but the proof will be in the pudding, and you haven't seen--

[Scott Vaughan]

We're at the very first baby step on this, which is our 120-day obligation to determine whether it's assessed. I think the proof in the pudding will be once this is completed and all the 28 departments go out and develop their strategies and what that will actually mean.

The strategy makes reference to continuous improvements. This is a planning process. So I think the proof in the pudding realistically will be a couple of years down the road. We're keen, at least from our signals, to get it right, out of the gate, so the direction is in the right way.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

In your initial overview of it, have you been pleased, are you a little concerned, or are you neutral around the aspect of targets and timelines being laid out or not clearly enough laid out?

[Scott Vaughan]

I mentioned the criteria. They're measurable; they're concrete.

One of the members asked the question about the importance. I think that will be in our determination of the review. We're going to look at it, and we've actually started to—Mr. Ferguson and colleagues in the office, with Mr. Sloan. We will go through every single one of those and see whether they meet the five criteria related to the SMART criteria, and then we will say very clearly to you, “yes, no, yes, no”, and where they're there and where they're not. So we haven't finished that evaluation.

I wish I could give you more.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

No, it's still early.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Bezan]

Thank you very much.

We'll continue on to Mr. Armstrong.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

First of all, happy Easter to you all. I really appreciate you coming in on a beautiful Thursday afternoon. You could be driving home and spending time with your families.

As we move forward, one of the practices that I support that is contained in this process is the SMART program—the specific, measurable, achievable, reasonable, and time-bound goals that you and each department will be setting—and also the continuous cycle of improvement, the “plan, do, check, improve” that Mr. Woodworth commented on.

Using this procedure in one department will be challenging, but trying to corral all 28 departments in the federal government in the whole-of-government approach—although I see great benefits to it instead of the scattergun approach that was used before—having one concise oversight measure forcing all the departments to get in line, I think is the way to go.

Is there a timeline for each department to have for you this plan that they're supposed to make? Who will evaluate this plan, and how will it be evaluated?

[Scott Vaughan]

Thank you.

Because I fear getting it wrong, let me ask my colleague Mr. Ferguson to go through the timeline of this.

[Andrew Ferguson]

Under the legislation, within one year of tabling of the final federal strategy, each of the 28 individual departments subject to the act is to table a strategy that contributes to the federal one.

So the answer is that somewhere around June or July 2011 we should see 28 individual departmental strategies. Then our mandate following that is to assess those and report to Parliament on whether they are contributing to the federal one.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

Thank you.

In order for some departments to do this, of course, there's going to be some sort of expenditure incurred. The proposed strategy would link the FSDS to the government's expenditure management system. Do you see this change as positive?

[Scott Vaughan]

As I said earlier, I think it is an important change. The expenditure management system is the nuts and bolts of the federal government in terms of budget planning and budget operations. Although we haven't gone through it, at least it has the potential, from my personal point of view, to mainstream the important objective of sustainable development and put it into the core apparatus of the federal government. We'll go back and look, but that's at least a preliminary view. There may be a little more detail that would have been helpful in order to answer those types of questions.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

From your analysis and knowing what you know of the 28 different federal departments from which you're requesting these plans, are some federal departments going to be more greatly challenged by the timelines than others, based on the nature of the departments?

[Scott Vaughan]

I wouldn't want to speculate, but maybe I'll ask my colleague Mr. Sloan about departmental timelines generally, and about meeting obligations.

[Bruce Sloan, Principal, Office of the Auditor General of Canada]

In reality, there is a range of practices out there, and certainly there is the capacity to respond to these types of requirements. Some departments will be faster than others. Whether some would be late, I couldn't say at this stage, but some departments just have more capacity. The larger ones have the specialized skills to respond.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

As a member of this committee, I would like to be certain that all departments meet the deadline for that report. I'd hate to see some departments placed above other departments, saying that they can't get that report in on time because of specific requirements within their own department. You're fairly confident that all departments, if they put their minds to it and make a good effort toward it, could meet the timeline fairly easily.

[Andrew Ferguson]

Our experience in the past has been that the 28 departments have tabled their sustainable development strategies on time every three years. I see no reason why that shouldn't continue to be the case.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

Okay. Thank you. I have time for one more question.

In testimony to this committee, Environment Canada spoke about the fact that this legislation and the proposed draft strategy to implement it are not meant to replace other decision-making processes of the government, but to make environmental decision-making more transparent.

Will it improve transparency, compared to the old system of sustainable development reporting?