Government Operations Committee on April 19th, 2007

[Nicole Jauvin]

May we take note of your figures and get back to you on them?

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

All right. I must say that I already met Mr. Fortier regarding this issue. Perhaps we could meet in order to shed some light on this, Mr. Toews. Moreover, your predecessor, Mr. Baird, had been informed about the issue. For the record, I had, in fact, provided information about this at the last meeting, but we can come back to it.

To follow up on the questions put my colleague Ms. Bourgeois, who has left, let me highlight another aspect of this, Mr. Minister. I would like to explain what we wanted to do earlier. I do not want to put spokes in your wheels, I just want to clarify matters. We are aware of the fact that every department must table its business plan before the House of Commons in February. Some elements have been developed, you have some approaches right here. This is what we presume, but we want to see whether the business plans of the various departments should be treated as a whole and analyzed to produce an overall management plan. Thus, we could see the connection between what has to be done and what each specific commitment costs.

In other words, do your plans show how each specific commitment will be met and how much it will cost? The documents we have here contain some elements of information, but we do not know how these things will be done or how much they will cost. Let me go further, Mr. Chairman, just to make sure that I can say everything before my time is up.

We are currently debating the issue of personnel. There is a shortage of personnel in the federal public service because people are retiring, due to the age of certain public servants, and to other demographic factors. For example, we see that in the last budget, there was a cut in the funding of the Canada School of Public Service. In the budget document, on pages 10-2 and 10-5, we see that there is a substantial cut in investment at a time when we should, on the contrary, be recruiting. We need an efficient school to ensure that things go smoothly in the public service. This is why we would like to know how each specific commitment will be met and how much they will cost, in order to avoid problems and to ensure that the Canada School of Public Service is ready to face current and future needs.

[Vic Toews, Conservative, Provencher, MB]

Thank you. I'm going to defer that question to Mr. Moloney.

Before I do, on your prior question, I want to state that Mr. Fortier will be here on Tuesday. You may want to raise that issue with him, because it's an issue directly the responsibility of the Minister of Public Works. It's not that I'm avoiding it, but you might want to raise it with Mr. Fortier when he's here on Tuesday. That's your prior question, about the 18.1% split.

As to the other question, Mr. Moloney will deal with it.

[David Moloney]

Let us take the Canada School of Public Service as an example. The document tabled before Parliament explains to a certain point the cost of each commitment, namely the total expenditures are distributed according to program activities. Each activity is carried out in view of a specific objective. We also find the costs of operational budgets and subsidies, if any, such as capital costs. Consequently, the cost of each commitment for each activity has been explained. The reports on plans and priorities contain more details regarding the expected results of each activity. We did not—

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Moloney, I do not want to be rude, but the thing that you are talking about now, namely how these things are done, has not been provided to us.

[David Moloney]

The way in which things are done is, in fact, explained in the reports.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

All right, but we do not have that here today. This is what was tabled in late February, according to the business plans.

[David Moloney]

It was in late February. It was tabled specifically in order to give more details to Parliament.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Thank you, Mr. Nadeau. Excuse me, but your time is up.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Diane Marleau]

Mr. Poilievre has the floor.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Thank you very much for appearing, Minister. We've all found your presentation to be very informative. I think I even extracted some material from your comments that might be useful in some of my community newsletters, so it's very informative for my constituents.

My question is directed to Mr. Moloney. I just want to clarify the increase in spending. Mr. Turner was talking about a 12.5% increase in government spending. That would be an inaccurate characterization, as I read it, given that $14,893,000,000 in line 21, page 5, part 1 of the government expense plan is a net adjustment. That's not an actual difference in the amount of dollars being spent but the way in which they're recorded. Is that correct?

[David Moloney]

I think that summary would be only partially correct, if I understood it myself. The total budgetary main estimate spending as displayed on page 1-5 is in fact a 5.9% increase. It is true that within that there is an operating and capital amount, which is increasing 11.3%. If I understood correctly, that was one of the earlier questions.

However, that in fact only refers to about $53 billion of the total $210 billion. When we also take account of transfer payments, payments to crown corporations, and public debt charges, we come to a total $210 billion, which rose 5.9%. That is in excess of the overall growth in the economy of about 4% this year.

[Wayne Wouters]

I tell you, I just think that last point is that when we compare growth to the economy, it's normally on the basis of nominal GDP as opposed to inflation. We usually look at the overall growth including real growth, and that's projected to grow about 4%. So normally the comparison there would be 5.9% to 4%.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

So it's not six times the inflation rate. We're not growing spending at six times the inflation rate, which is less than a quarter of the budget.

[David Moloney]

We're distinguishing between the inflation rate and the rate of growth in the dollar value of the economy, which is inflation plus real growth.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Right. So in fact Mr. Turner did have it wrong.

On net adjustments, I'd like if you could re-explain the point, number 21 on page 1-5, “Net Adjustment, from net to gross basis of Budget Presentation”. Could you explain how that impacts on the change in spending found on line 22?

[David Moloney]

What we're referring to there in terms of net adjustment, from net to gross basis, is in fact helping the reader go from the voted spending to the basis of the budget documents, which are in fact on a gross basis. So the overall spending--and in fact, for reference, if members or the committee staff have occasion to look at the latest budget, page 295, the Department of Finance and the Treasury Board Secretariat have arranged that going forward, and this budget was the first example. We will be providing a more detailed disaggregation of what goes into this adjustment and net adjustment and reconciliation.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Mr. Moloney, what you're saying, though, is that this is a change in reporting.

[David Moloney]

There's one reporting here in the main estimates and one change.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Right, but this is a change in reporting. This is not a change in fiscal expenditures of $14,893,000,000. It is a change in reporting.

[David Moloney]

It's showing the relationship between two different bases of reporting.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Right, but the point is that in 2006-07 it says zero, and in 2007-08 it says $14,893,000,000. That is a change in reporting. It's not that there has been the birth of $14 billion in new expenditures.

[David Moloney]

I'm sorry, I misunderstood. That's absolutely right. There was a change in the budget's basis of reporting—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

I think that's where Mr. Turner had made his mistake. It was based on that change in reporting that he came up with the notion that spending has gone up by 12.5%, which is demonstrably false now that you clarified that for him.

I'll move on to my next question. Your estimates have an allocation for the Toronto waterfront revitalization initiative. How are those funds being used and why is it important that this be with Treasury Board? I can offer that to the minister or one of the officials.