Evidence of meeting #69 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was information.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Right. But the two main programs that still exist would be the Canadian development expenses and the Alberta crown royal adjustments.
Principal, Office of the Auditor General
Thank you.
The list that we have on pages 9 and 10 reflects the specific subsidies that are not considered to be benchmark tax subsidies. We show that there are six of them that have been phased out, as mentioned in the budget announcement, and it happened between 2011 and 2015.
Two of the others that are referred to as not applicable you'll see at the end of our report in what we refer to as “subsequent event”. It follows the conclusion. That subsequent event reflects the announcement in budget 2017 to phase out those two tax measures.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
What I'm trying to get at—and I'm sorry but I'm limited on time—is why do you think that the phase-out has been so challenging?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
Without actually having access to the information that the Department of Finance has, the analysis is really difficult for me to tell you that. That would be a great question to ask the Department of Finance.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Okay. I'm going to switch gears then for a second. There are some subsidies that exist at the provincial government level, right? I know that for Ontario I think there's about $100 million for exploration of gas, if I'm not mistaken. In order to meet these targets, how important is it for the federal government to be working with the provincial government on this? Is it safe to say that it can't happen without provincial buy-in?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
Unfortunately, my mandate only pertains to the federal government. I cannot answer that question. It would have to go to the provincial legislatures.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Right. In order to meet targets of complete phase-out it's going to require that?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
All I can audit is the federal government's role in that.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Okay. Then I guess it's safe to assume that if it doesn't happen that there's co-operation with the provincial governments then it's very likely that that phase-out would not happen.
Is it safe to say that it's one of the things that's making it challenging?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
You know what, I really can't tell you that. The Department of Finance might be able to tell you that, but I can't tell you that.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
It's just that I wanted to talk about it later.
Are you aware of the breakdown between the provincial subsidies and the federal government subsidies, of what the percentages are one way or the other?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
At this point all I looked at is what I'm allowed to look at, which is the federal government. I can't access that information, other than what's in the public domain. My audit is an audit of the federal government achieving its commitment.
Liberal
Mark Gerretsen Liberal Kingston and the Islands, ON
Okay. Those are all of my questions, Madam Chair.
Thank you.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Deb Schulte
We have two minutes for your side. Does anyone else want to pick it up?
Okay, the next one up is Mr. Shields.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I'm glad to have you here today. The question I would ask—and maybe you can't answer it—is how we are going to get that definition of who is responsible for inefficient fuel sources. You're struggling with the definition, aren't you?
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
I'm not struggling with the definition. Each government is supposed to define it in their own context. There's a G20 definition that talks about inefficient subsidies as being things that reduce energy security, waste fossil fuels, and that kind of thing. There is already a G20 definition, but the government was supposed to define it for Canada.
Conservative
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
Right now we're using the G20 one. We've asked the government for their definition, and they have not provided us one yet.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
The first thing we need is a definition, clearly, so that you can move ahead.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
We made a recommendation that they do exactly that.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
The numbers won't mean anything if you don't have a definition.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
And it's hard for them to do a complete analysis that meets our criteria, if we don't even have a definition. They don't have a definition.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
Right. You talked about grants or loans, and I can talk about billions that went to Bombardier, who supposedly use fossil fuel to support an industry. I could say that might be something you could look at.
Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General
Environment and Climate Change Canada has a plan to go to all the different ministries to find out all the non-tax measures. We should soon have a compilation of them. We could audit that information and provide you with the results.
Conservative
Martin Shields Conservative Bow River, AB
Right.
You've identified some; we have those here. They were started back as far as 2011. You've been able to follow those through. You've been able to do analysis. You've been able to get information on six that you have in your report.