Government Operations Committee on Oct. 30th, 2012

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

I think that was more a comment than a question, Mr. Matthews, but....

[Bill Matthews]

I'll be very quick. The member is quite right in terms of how there is a detailed structure that starts at a high level as a strategic outcome and goes down; there is more information as you go down through the various levels.

My concern is that providing information on sub-activities or at a more detailed level is one thing, and asking Parliament to vote at that level is a very different discussion; that would be, in my mind, too onerous in terms of a management structure. That's why we want to come back with these mock-ups to actually show members what they would get.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

That's fair enough.

Thank you, Mr. Ravignat.

Thank you, Mr. Matthews.

Mike Wallace is next.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the second opportunity.

I don't know if we'll have any more questions after this, but I'm going to focus on recommendation 12, if you don't mind. I'm one of the individuals who looks at things, and I didn't actually know, to be frank with you, that there was.... I knew about the tax expenditure piece and that it was straight numbers. I didn't know that there were reviews of how we're doing. As an example, with the youth tax credit or whatever, there's a review of how that program is doing and the goals we were trying to achieve. I appreciate that.

Also, I appreciate that you're in line with the committee's intent and that you're willing to bring it to a committee to discuss it if they ask you to come in and discuss this thing.

I have two questions.

Would it be more valuable, in your mind, since we are talking about programming—and I'm really looking forward to what the Treasury Board is going to bring forward, as it really sounds great—for us to actually look not at the tax expenditure documentation, but at the actual review of how the programs are doing? That is one of my questions.

My other question is on your response. I want to be clear on it. You say, “...the yearly budget process, in studies published in Tax Expenditures and Evaluations,” and then you have, “or through consultations, advisory committees...”. Does this mean that some tax expenditures are not in that document because they've been reviewed in another process?

My third question is this: do we, as members of Parliament, vote on tax expenditures? I know you're saying that it's the purview of the.... I understand that it's not the departments' responsibility and it's the responsibility of Minister of Finance, but as members of Parliament, do we not actually vote somewhere along the line on these tax expenditures in support of them happening?

Those are my three questions. Good luck in answering them.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[Frank Des Rosiers]

Thank you for your wishes.

On those three questions in order, on whether it would be more appropriate to look at the tax expenditure report or at the evaluation, the publication contains both elements in the same package. We'd be happy to entertain any questions on any of those elements—

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Have you ever been called to a committee on it?

[Frank Des Rosiers]

I'm not aware of past practices going way back. I do know that we're getting regular queries from other parliamentarians, other ministers' offices, stakeholders, think tanks, and citizens. We're getting a lot of queries, year in and year out.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Okay. I've been on the finance committee for five years. I don't remember ever asking you guys to come in and talk about it.

[Frank Des Rosiers]

On your point in terms of the consultation or expert advisory committees and whether we had full coverage of those tax expenditures, yes, we did. We do our very best each and every year to try and capture the entirety of it. We make improvements year by year to make sure that the data are as reliable as can be, based on the information that we collect. That's what leads to having a package that is some 60 pages or so in length.

On your last question on whether parliamentarians have an opportunity to vote on those tax expenditures, the answer is yes. You do so through those budget bills that are being presented before you. Most recently it was the BIA 2. That's been the practice for decades now.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

My point was that since parliamentarians actually do vote on them, I think they have a responsibility to review them, and I'm glad that you're in support of coming to committee if asked to review that.

Those are my questions, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

Thank you very much, Mike. I do take your point.

I notice that the last sentence of the government's response is in fact that the government will direct the Department of Finance officials to provide briefings on the tax expenditures and evaluations report at the committee's request, and that's something you might want to consider as a committee.

Jean-François Larose, you have five minutes.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

The real problem is that the Department of Finance and the Treasury Board Secretariat do not share sufficient information. We are talking about fragility, but also about human factors. Synchronizing approvals at an executive level can also be a major issue.

What can be done to overcome this challenge? Yes, we are going through a fiscal restraint period, and it seems to me that there is a lack of effort. Earlier, you talked about the divide between the central budget agencies. Do you have any comments on that?

[Bill Matthews]

I'll start and maybe turn to my colleagues.

The issue in terms of sharing really only comes up.... Part of the budget development process involves budget secrecy. Department of Finance colleagues try to keep to a minimum the number of officials who are aware of what's coming in the budget, and there's good reason for that. We can maybe explore that a bit further.

On the executive process that leads into Treasury Board approval—because it is in support of Treasury Board approval—I think that's a value-added process. As I said, before we bring spending plans to Parliament for approval, we'd want assurance that departments know how they're going to spend the money and what indicators and measurements they will use to evaluate the success of their programs. That leads to our reports on plans and priorities, our evaluations. Fundamental to this process is asking whether the programs are achieving their objectives. Without that step, you risk losing something.

I'm not sure if my colleague wants to add anything else on budget development.

[Douglas Nevison]

I'll just add, as Bill mentioned, that TBS has a wealth of information in terms of how programs operate, or performance measures. That's very valuable in assessing similar programs when it comes to the front end of the budget process. Where we can, keeping in mind this issue of budget secrecy, sharing information is something we encourage. Obviously, we try to make that as efficient as possible.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

In this case, if we switch to a system based on strategic outcomes, will we not lose control of spending even more? It seems that it is easy to reduce capital expenditures in a fiscal restraint period and that a vote system based on outcomes or programs poses a risk in terms of losing some control of certain key expenditures that are less visible to the public, but still critical.

[Bill Matthews]

I would say we have to separate what Parliament votes on and what information is available in support of what Parliament votes on. While you may vote funds at a high level, the database could actually contain information that supports more detailed information, building up to that voted amount. I would keep separate the notion of what Parliament actually votes on at a higher level, but it doesn't mean you can't have more details in support of the database.

That's the whole idea here, to give parliamentarians as much detail as we can in terms of what supports that vote. They can drill down if they want to, but the balance we're trying to strike is that if you vote at too detailed a level, the whole system becomes too administrative. You keep the vote at a reasonably high level, but you support it with additional information.

I think the idea here is recommendation 16: the best way to do that additional information is a database. I think we would have to go beyond what Parliament votes on and give supporting detail.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

You have about a minute and a half.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Concerning the database, we spoke about this at length the last time you were here as a witness. How long do you think it would take to put it to use? Are we at the stage of even going there right now?

[Bill Matthews]

You're not going to see anything come up in the next few months. In our response, we've committed to March 31. We have a few things to get back to. We will come back with detailed timelines for when this would be up and running. I don't want to promise something I can't deliver. By March 31 you'll have a good sense of when that will come up.

[Jean-François Larose, NDP, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

Thank you, Jean-François.

Next is Kelly Block, for the Conservatives.

[Kelly Block, Conservative, Saskatoon—Rosetown—Biggar, SK]

I don't know that I have questions, but I have a couple of observations, following on previous questions and answers from my colleagues.

Early on in our study, the observation was made that it wasn't for lack of information that we decided to do this study. There was more than enough information. The issue was to connect the dots or make the linkages. For example, with the tax expenditures, did we know that there was something posted on the website about the effectiveness of those tax expenditures? Did we know it's considered a best practice to do that? I think this has been very helpful.

More to the point, I would disagree with my colleague, who characterized this study as trying to improve the quality of information. I think we have lots of good information; it's about being able to make those linkages. I think that's what's been really important about this study.

[The Chair, NDP, Pat Martin]

Thank you, Kelly.

We still have speakers on our list.

For the Liberals, we have John McCallum. Would you like to have another go?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Just to respond to Kelly, it's obvious that the Parliamentary Budget Officer doesn't think he has sufficient information. That's why he's taking the government to court.

I'd like to ask a question to the Department of Finance. I don't understand the logic of the statement that the Parliamentary Budget Officer's mandate is to study money that is spent, rather than cuts. You can't know how much money is actually going to be spent until you subtract the cuts from the previous number. How can you have a true statement of expenditures without knowing what the cuts are? It seems to be logically impossible.