Government Operations Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2011

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

I wonder if the clerk could ask for the cooperation of the Senate to share those documents with us. They may be useful.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Okay. Is that fine?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

I have a couple of minutes left in the hour here. I did say to Mr. Holder that I would give him a couple of minutes to finish his line of questioning.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Thank you very much.

When we undertook to review the whole issue of the parliamentary precinct, Madam Fraser, I think one of the things that we all talked about was that this was an opportunity for this committee to effectively establish a legacy. There were some things that we could do that would be meaningful for this place, something that would live beyond all of us, and hopefully, it would not take as long as until after we die, but certainly we could set the framework for it.

I think it's really clear that what we all agreed we would do.... This isn't an issue of trying to find blame. This is an issue of trying to come together for the right reason. I think part of that is trying to find that balance between what I would call care and cost. It's always the kind of thing that we try to look at.

It seems to me that when you raised the three considerations--accountability relationships, long-term plans to rehabilitate the buildings, and stable and long-term funding--it struck me that the stable and long-term funding piece was probably the glue that makes this work.

Is there a way from a funding standpoint...? I would imagine that any government of the day.... Because this problem isn't just today's. It didn't occur just in this last year or in the last five, ten or fifteen years. It has been something that, frankly, it's critical for us to tackle.

Acknowledging that we want to balance budgets or work towards that as we go forward--and the Canadian people are asking us to do that—from your perspective, how do we fix that with the notion that these are considerable expenses that need to be undertaken to make this place work? From a budgeting standpoint, how do you imagine that could work, please?

[Sheila Fraser]

Chair, we've called for, and I will continue to call until the end of my mandate...I think there need to be longer fiscal projections. We see the Parliament buildings, but there are also a number of other challenges facing government fiscal pressures that are going to come.

Almost every review that we do of crown corporations points to funding rusting infrastructure, be it the ferries to Newfoundland or postal modernization, and when we talk about IT systems in government, there are going to be needs there. So there has to be I think a really clear portrait drawn of what are all these requirements that are going to be coming over the next few years. How is government planning to deal with that, in addition to an aging population and climate change, which are both going to put pressure on the fiscal situation? So I think longer-term projections and engaging in a dialogue with Canadians about how government is going to pay for all of this....

Then, on the mechanics of all of this, this committee in the past actually undertook a study of accrual appropriations--certain members will recall that--and actually made a recommendation concerning multi-year appropriations. I really think that's the way to go. On some of these very large projects that are going to span several years, there needs to be more assurance of the funding. It doesn't mean, of course, that a subsequent government or Parliament can't come in and then stop it. But there needs to be more stability in funding.

The committee might wish to go back and actually look at some of the really good work that was done on the whole question of accrual appropriations and multi-year funding. That would have been done about three or four years ago, probably.

I think there needs to be a change in the way we look at some of the challenges that are coming and the way these projects are funded.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Holder.

On behalf of the committee, I want to thank Madam Fraser, thoughtful and well researched as always.

We appreciate your contributions to this discussion.

[Sheila Fraser]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

I'm going to suspend for a couple of minutes while we go in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]