Government Operations Committee on Oct. 24th, 2016

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Yes, that's right. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Before the minister has to leave, we have two final interventions of five minutes each.

Mr. Clarke, you're up for five.

[Alupa Clarke, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

I think I can stay a little bit longer, if you folks are all right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

All right. Well, we'll try to complete an entire round of questioning.

Thank you for that, Minister.

Mr. Clarke, you have five minutes.

[Alupa Clarke, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for this candid approach. We are very pleased you can stay longer. Thank you for being here with us today. It is much appreciated.

For Her Majesty's official opposition, this is a very interesting reform. Of course we would like to see a reform that guarantees the well-being of all Canadians. We are considering this reform very seriously and have questions that are serious as well. First of all, we think it entirely laudable to provide more coherence in order to improve the estimates review process that members carry out on behalf of Canadians.

I would like to continue along the lines of what my colleague Mr. McCauley was saying. You seemed to be saying we need an adjustment period. We think it might be a good idea to do what they are doing in Australia and to publish the budget and main estimates on the same day. Your departmental colleague mentioned that adjustments would have to be made to ensure greater flexibility. Could you tell us what those adjustments are that would have to be spread over a number of years?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Clarke. I very much appreciate your question.

When significant changes are made to the departments' activities, departments that work together obviously need time to implement those changes. My objective is to arrive at a process in which the budget and main estimates are—

[Alupa Clarke, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Published simultaneously?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

—presented at approximately the same time. My model is that of Australia. I have expressed my interest in that model for a long time, but it takes time to make changes. I think we may need two more years for the departments to adjust to those changes. I believe, just as you do, that the new model may possibly be an improvement.

[Alupa Clarke, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Minister, that leads me to another question.

The official opposition wants to ensure that the period traditionally allotted to members to evaluate the budget will not be shortened. We understand the concepts of flexibility, adjustments, and so on. That brings me to another point.

You feel it will take two or three years for the adjustments to be made. To demonstrate your goodwill, would it not be a good idea to take this opportunity to include a clause in the act providing that, within two or three years, the budget and main estimates will be presented on the same day?

Do you consider that a good idea and would you agree to explore it?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

It is the prerogative of the committee and of Parliament to consider the possibility of amending the regulations. I am amenable to improvements being made on an ongoing basis. We call that an evergreen process. If we amend our process today, in a few months or years—perhaps two years or two budget cycles—we will have a better understanding of the changes and the possibility of making more of them. This is an important step. I am entirely amenable to the idea of other improvements being made in future.

[Alupa Clarke, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Thank you, Minister.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you so much.

Mr. Graham, welcome back to the committee, sir. You have five minutes.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Thank you.

Minister, I want to build on something you said at the beginning of your comments, and that was alluded to rather explicitly by Mr. Weir, that you have the most experience of any government caucus member in opposition and that you therefore have a tremendous amount of experience in reading the main estimates and the supplementaries.

I remember, as a staffer, going to your office and getting, from your staff, translation of the estimates into plain English, as I found them dissected on every horizontal and vertical surface of your office.

With this experience in that role, in concrete terms, how would this have changed your life if this had been the case over the last 10 years?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Well, we had to work awfully hard in opposition. I had a tremendous person—Tisha Ashton—who still works with me. In terms of budget and estimates work, there's been a handful of us over the years who have spent a lot of time on this.

You shouldn't have to work that hard, as a member of Parliament, or as a staff person of a member of Parliament, simply to understand what is fundamental to your job—that is, government spending and being able to hold the government to account. It is asinine that so much work goes into translating government documents and processes into an understandable format that we can scrutinize. It didn't make sense for me in opposition and it doesn't make sense to me in government.

To the credit of Treasury Board, I can say that a lot of good work was done there in the past. In fact I spoke to Tony Clement last week about some of this, and he told me that at that time he was aware of some of this work and understood the importance of it. This has been percolating within the public service for some time. I happen to feel very strongly about it.

As a member of Parliament, you don't want to admit that you don't understand this. There are ministers in any cabinet, however, who don't have a lot of parliamentary experience. There are people who have been around Parliament for a long time. As it is now, this is not a system that is designed to be understood. We want to change that.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

There are people who don't do their own taxes who have to understand this stuff.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

In the same vein, are there other subtle improvements around the edges that you would want to see and that we have not addressed?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

I really want to get some of these changes done and moved forward. The part that we have to spend a lot of time on is the departmental report. This morning we're not talking much about the departmental reports, but I think that's a big item. I think program-based budgeting for members of Parliament, parliamentarians....

I say “members of Parliament”, but I'm also talking about Senators. There is a lot of expertise in the Senate on budget estimates processes, particularly on the Senate finance committee.

It's my view that Parliament better engaged, parliamentary committees better engaged, Parliament as a whole better engaged, can help contribute to the analysis of budget items and measure the effectiveness of them. There should be some things we can agree on, on a non-partisan basis; one consists of measures that will clearly improve the ability of Parliament to do its job.

[David Graham, Liberal, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

In the few seconds I have left, Mr. Whalen has one quick follow-up question.

Thank you, Minister.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Thank you, David.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Mr. Whalen.

[Nick Whalen, Liberal, St. John's East, NL]

Minister Brison, on the approach you're proposing to align the estimates with the budget now, but then to continue to examine the accounting methods, the votes, and the continuous improvement of departmental reports, I feel this aligns with what our committee has heard. I don't think we've heard enough yet on accounts and votes, accruals and different cost measures. We've engaged our study, but with respect to this first change, it sounds like it's something the department is able and ready to do.

If we were to recommend something, are we ready yet to put a date—like, no more than x days after the budget is tabled and no later than May 1? Would that be a more helpful formulation, or are we not quite ready for that type of restriction?

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Please give a quick answer.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

I'll have a better idea of this over the next year or so. I'm being candid with you: what we're doing here is quite a fundamental change. We will be pushing to have a closer alignment of the budget and estimates, sequentially the main estimates after the budget. We'll have a better idea after the main estimates and budget process of 2017.

Any time this committee invites me, I'll gladly be here, and of course I will be here to defend estimates. One of the things we can talk about, in addition to those estimates specifically, is this process. We'll have a better idea then. It does take a while to operationalize these things.

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