Evidence of meeting #87 for Finance in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was office.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
For any officer of Parliament, for example, the Auditor General, have you heard of any kinds of work plans that need to be approved by the Speakers in both houses? Have you heard of that?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
No. It's not in the legislation. The Auditor General does not require the Speakers to approve their work plans, though again, the Office of the Auditor General provides work plans on what they feel based on their lens, usually risk material—and their forecast projections for when they will complete reports over a four year cycle.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Okay.
This is not being asked of any of the other officers of Parliament you know of, even the office of the environment commissioner?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
Again, the idea of producing a work plan is a great idea. It should be produced. Do you want the Speakers to have a final say or control over what's in that work plan or not? That's the point of contention for me. I don't think we do.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Do you think the government has done a proper job or do you think that this is literally.... By the minister even saying he is open to amendments, I think means that he knows that his own office or his own department did not do the proper work of consulting and have to make changes in light of it. Would you agree with that?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
Yes, but again to be honest, I compliment the government on saying that they are open to amendments. I'm somebody who's been in the financial community since around 1980 and it's rare to see governments open to amendments on budget implementation bills. So that by itself I find is a positive. Would more consultation help bring consensus around this committee on what kind of parliamentary budget officer you want now and in the future? I think it will.
Conservative
Dan Albas Conservative Central Okanagan—Similkameen—Nicola, BC
Just to get this on the record, Mr. Chair, we're in favour of seeing this become a full office of Parliament. However, given the process that we have and given the large amount of amendments that are going to be necessary, we do think it would be in the best interests of everyone to pull back to form a special committee or to perhaps have a joint session of two different committees of both houses and then introduce it as a first reading so that the committee can actually get into making amendments as are necessary before we have second reading.
The reason, Mr. Chair, on that point though is that we want to see the institution become a full office, but we also want to make sure there's proper independence and that we've had the discussion with the international community, we've had the discussion with all parliamentarians, before moving forward.
Conservative
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Page, for staying. I appreciate your comments in regard to our government's commitment and acknowledgement of amendments.
I certainly see that my role as a committee member here today is to listen to testimony and consider whether or not we need to put forward amendments, so that's where I'm basing my questions here today.
You mentioned in your own opening statement, and just now you also acknowledged, the fact that there are other things we need to talk about in this proposed legislation, so I'm going to talk about something that you touched on but we haven't talked about yet. That's the access to information and the recourse for that.
You mentioned very briefly about the opportunity for the PBO to go to a federal court. If this were to be something to be included, how do you see that process? Have you envisioned a process or do you think the PBO should go straight to a federal court if they feel they haven't received the proper information?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
No. I don't think the PBO should go directly to a federal court if it doesn't get the information. In my experience as the parliamentary budget officer, we ran into significant problems getting information from public servants that was very important to bring forth to members of a committee like this.
There is a process. There was notification. The practice that we had in place and that is still in place is that when we needed information to serve you, we would write a letter and explain that this is a request from an MP. We would send that letter to the accountability office of the department. We would get a response back. Often we got a response back saying, we're not going to give you that information.
In one case, following budget 2012, basically the whole government said they were not going to give us their fiscal plans for budget 2012, the departmental spending plans. After many multiple requests, and after going to the committee as well raising this—and members of the government of the day were saying, you're exceeding your mandate—we went to the Federal Court for a reference opinion. In the current legislation, however, if you pull up Federal Court you'll see that this privilege would be taken away from the parliamentary budget officer even as a last resort.
You want to get a process here that, with a series of escalating steps of notification, of involvement of MPs, eventually maybe even potentially going to the Federal Court....
You could even consider sanctions. If the accountability officer is saying, “We're not going to give you this information”, and you cannot do your job, and your job is absolutely vital to this country, potentially I could see a sanction on an accountability officer—a deduction of pay, a removal from the job—because it's fundamentally important that you get this information.
Liberal
Jennifer O'Connell Liberal Pickering—Uxbridge, ON
Thank you. I appreciate that explanation.
In addition to that, frankly there may even be a necessity, in some cases, whether it's on an issue of cabinet confidentially or of national security. At least having the rationale as to why that information isn't going to be released is, I would think, important.
That somewhat leads into my next question, in regard to some language or concerns about information the PBO might receive in the course of doing its work—information they have received, not their full report—and whether they can release that information or not.
Is this an area of concern for you? Is it an area in which you feel amendments are needed, or are you comfortable with the language?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
It goes back to what Mr. Khan said. If you have an experienced budgetary official leading the office, they would be quite familiar with the rules and restrictions around personal information, around solicitor-client information, around cabinet confidence, or access to information. I certainly, and Mr. Khan as well, spent many years in the Privy Council Office dealing with these sorts of issues.
We haven't had a problem like that, but there could even be, in the context of a fuller discussion around what should be made available to the parliamentary budget officer.... We never asked to see specific details of cabinet types of documents or Treasury Board documents from officials on various costing. I don't actually think we need to see those, but it's possible that individual MPs here think, “We want a parliamentary budget officer to see this type of information.” A committee like this could delve into that issue.
Perhaps Mr. Khan wants to add to this.
Executive Vice-President, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
Just to echo Mr. Page's comments, we received information in some cases that was classified, from a security point of view. We knew how to handle it, and we're fortunate to say that in our five years we didn't have a leak of such information.
It is about establishing appropriate protocols. I don't think in our time in the parliamentary budget office we were ever asking for information that was classified. There might be a debate as to whether something is a cabinet confidence, and there are protocols for that. You could ask the clerk to certify that something is a cabinet confidence. There are, then, ways to escalate.
To reflect back upon your question concerning the Federal Court, hopefully it never comes to it, but if there is recourse, the incentives for actors within the system are likely to be a little more positive towards sharing of information than if everyone knows that at the end of the day there is no recourse for the PBO. That may be one way to look at this issue of Federal Court recourse, that it's hopefully rare. If you get to that point, you're dealing with a pretty serious issue, and I imagine that by then parliamentarians are probably quite exercised about it anyway.
Conservative
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Thank you, Chair.
Mr. Page, Mr. Khan, welcome to the House of Commons committee.
Mr. Page, it is a great pleasure and an honour for me to be able to speak to you directly.
You performed your duties at the office of the PBO with honour and dignity, and we all acknowledge that.
My question is very simple. What problems did you face that needed to be resolved by a change in procedure at the Parliamentary Budget Office?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
We want members of Parliament to be very comfortable, with the kind of parliamentary budget office they want. I think the more you can go through, on a clause-by-clause basis, the questions of whether this legislation captures the purpose, whether it's the precise mandate that you want, whether these are the kinds of reports you want to see every year from the parliamentary budget officer, what the relationships with committees and individual MPs are, what the qualifications of the individual PBO are.... The more you can get comfortable with that...because this legislation, once it's done, could last decades before it needs to be changed, as we've seen in other countries. Getting as comfortable as possible in understanding the modus operandi of this office would be the best use of this committee.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Tabling your work plan for a full year at the offices of the Speaker of the House and the Speaker of the Senate was not a thing meant to steer or to change, was it?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
There are some very specific amendments that we propose. The current parliamentary budget officer has a very similar set of amendments. That is clearly one, around work plans and the Speakers.
As a parliamentary budget officer, I struggle with the legislation right from reading the purpose. Right from the very get-go, it's the platitudes around its being good for transparency, good for accountability. Actually, you cannot do your financial due diligence job without a parliamentary budget office. You need to see this information, you need to have costings, and you should have second data points. This goes right to the very purpose. This is fundamental to what you do as individual MPs. I would go beyond that. I think there is an opportunity to make significant amendments to the legislation.
Conservative
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
I would clearly lay out the purpose. I would more clearly specify the mandate. I would be very particular on the qualifications of the budget officer that you want.
On the information provisions, we just heard questions. You need to get to the point that you know right now how you will handle those situations when the government of the day, perhaps a year or two before an election, says they're not giving you the information. I would work through these various types of scenarios.
I would build in an external review function for this office, so that after five or seven years you can have an external review of the office to assess whether it's performing its function and living up to your needs.
These are specific things. We've drafted language around the budget implementation act. The current parliamentary budget officer has done the same. We have, then, a good starting point.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
But is there a need for a provision for a work plan to be adopted or vetoed by the Speaker of the Senate?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
Absolutely not, sir. There is a need to have a work plan and a need to have an annual report; however, I think it would politicize the office, if the Speaker of the day—particularly of the House of Commons, who is an elected member appointed to that position and under a lot of pressure—said, I wouldn't want the parliamentary budget officer of the day doing this sort of work. It would not be advantageous. I think you take away the independence of the office.
Conservative
Gérard Deltell Conservative Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC
Why did you point out specifically the Speaker of the House of Commons because they are elected? Do you think the Speaker of the Senate, who is appointed directly by one person in Canada, which is the Prime Minister of Canada, has more authority than the Speaker of the House of Commons?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of Fiscal Studies and Democracy
No. I should have mentioned both, sir. Your point is well taken.
In my own experience, within the first few months, after we released the first few reports I was getting letters from both Speakers, who were really concerned about our operating model. Eventually, at the end of my tenure, we went into Federal Court on opposite sides on this. We were literally getting this reference opinion with the Speakers on the other side of the fence arguing that we shouldn't be seeking this type of opinion from the Federal Court. Again, then, it risks politicizing the office.
