Government Operations Committee on June 12th, 2019

[Karen Cahill]

That's not necessarily true.

Allow me to clarify something, if I may. I wasn't talking about budgeting. I actually referred to costing. It's something departments are doing more and more of. Coming up with accurate estimates requires the right tools.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—Saint-Lambert, QC]

My question ties in with what Mr. Blaikie was asking Mr. Purves about.

Under vote 10, I believe, funding in the amount of $90 million is being requested with few details on how the money will be used and what programs it will support. Is that due to the fact that departments lack the capacity to adequately account for how they will spend the funding allocated to them?

[Karen Cahill]

No, I don't think that's it. A number of steps go into coming up with an estimate. I can give you an example that relates to our department. It relates to what you see in one of the votes. When we include an initiative in the estimates, we provide the best possible estimate we are capable of at the time. As you know, once the initiative is approved, the request goes to cabinet, to the Treasury Board. That is the time to spell out the costs and the number of people. The details of the program or initiative are then fleshed out.

The funding requests are submitted to the Treasury Board, and, in many cases, you also see them because the spending authorities are approved at the parliamentary level. We are then able to provide more accurate estimates. To begin with, only the broad strokes of the initiative are laid out, but as it is developed, the associated costs become clearer. That is altogether different from the issue related to vote 10.

As I told Ms. Ratansi, the challenge of costing falls to us, and the people responsible are highly competent. Nevertheless, when an initiative is still in its infancy, the costs are often less detailed. We provide more detailed costing as the initiative is developed, and that is prior to the submission to the Treasury Board.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—Saint-Lambert, QC]

If I understand correctly, that state of affairs has nothing to do with vote 10, for which details are lacking.

[Karen Cahill]

No, that's not always the case.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—Saint-Lambert, QC]

What's the problem with vote 10, then? Why aren't there more details so that Parliament knows exactly what it is voting on? Why isn't it fleshed out?

[Karen Cahill]

Vote 10 falls more within Mr. Purves's domain.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—Saint-Lambert, QC]

I know Ms. Santiago would also be quite capable of answering the question.

[Glenn Purves]

Thank you for your question.

For vote 10, again, as I said to Mr. Blaikie, these are for horizontal initiatives. They cover many departments. There are design aspects that are still being worked out. It's not known what the precise amounts are that are going to be allocated for each department, so it can't necessarily be treated in the same way that some of these budget measures have been treated, where the precise amounts are known for different departments and then they're put in budget implementation votes.

Again, the details are still to be worked out, but it's still a horizontal strategic initiative where the expectation is that the funding would be needed before the next supply window or appropriation act.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Mr. McCauley.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I have a last couple of things for you. I'm looking at the departmental plan.

I have a quote here from the “Departmental Results”, on page 1:

Canadians deserve to know how the government spends their tax dollars, what results are expected from government programs, and what is being achieved.

When I look at page 11 of your departmental plan, the very first one, on the results, states: “Departments achieve measurable results”, with the indicators, and the “[p]ercentage of departmental results indicators for which targets are achieved”, and then, under “Target”, a non-specific target is put in. It's ironic. Why would we not put an exact target?

The very next one is Treasury Board proposals. The target is “at least”—not a firm number. Again, these are paper documents tabled in Parliament to hold the government and departments accountable, but the plan is between 75% and 85%, or “at least”. Why, in the Treasury Board, which is supposed to be the leader on the departmental plans, are we still seeing such problems, I guess?

[Glenn Purves]

I'll kick in just from the broader vantage point. I think the root of your issue is, why aren't indicators either better indicators or more specific, or why is there ambiguity around this?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

Yes. If your boss asked you “What are your goals for the year?”, nowhere would you would get away with saying, “Between 75 and 80” or “at least this.”

[Glenn Purves]

I would say—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

You're supposed to be the leader on this, and yet, according to the Treasury Board framework, your own departmental plan isn't, I guess, up to snuff.

[Glenn Purves]

I wouldn't characterize it like that. I think that the policy on results was put into place in 2016, and as part of that, every department has to create its departmental results framework. It has to identify the indicators that are most useful and most measurable to be able to actually identify results related to its core responsibilities, as you know. Through the departmental plans and the departmental results reports, I think we've seen an evolution over the last couple years in how these indicators are being refined and the type of indicators being used. Certainly the indicator that you're citing—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

So you're saying next year there will be more specific numbers?

[Glenn Purves]

I would say that, as more time goes on, you're going to have more refinement in a lot of these indicators, because you tend to have more experience with the actual data behind them, and over time you tend to have a narrowing of indicators, as well, in terms of ones that you find are more meaningful. That's part of the reason we have that GC InfoBase, because we want to make sure that Canadians can actually access this. What are the hits they are searching on? To use Treasury Board's departmental plan as an example, what are Canadians interested in about that departmental plan? What are the indicators they're interested in?

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

The departmental plan is setting out the department's priorities and what Canadians can expect. I would think that Canadians expect to know what they're getting for—

[Glenn Purves]

I would say that those priorities are very clear in the departmental plan. You're saying that one indicator is not up to snuff. We have a lot of indicators, and I think these are things that we continue to improve. Certainly in terms of the OGGO report—I think that was your recommendation 11 or 12—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

I have one last minute. I think we'll move on from my....

[Glenn Purves]

Sure.

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

In the Q and A for Treasury Board, on the estimates, question 7 says:

Most of my organization's Budget measures have not yet been approved by Treasury Board. What can I say about those measures at a committee appearance?

The answer is:

Give brief, high-level responses that stay as close as possible to the Budget narrative.

I don't think you wrote that, but when you look at the government's own website, the definition of the budget is “a financial expression of...government...policies”, with the estimates providing “a breakdown...of how government plans to spend public funds”. We're advising public servants, when they're asked questions about the estimates that they don't have answers for, to stay as close as possible to the political narrative. Do you not see any issue?

[Glenn Purves]

No, I wouldn't characterize it that way at all. I think, coming out of the experience last year, the interest was in ensuring that—

[Kelly McCauley, Conservative, Edmonton West, AB]

This is from your own documents, though.