Oh, oh!
Evidence of meeting #56 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was post.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #56 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was post.
A video is available from Parliament.
12:05 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
12:05 p.m.
Liberal
Francis Drouin Liberal Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
I want to understand why you're so interested in providing more transparency and effectively making the opposition's job to hold government to account easier. Can you elaborate on why you're so interested in this?
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS
To be honest, I actually think that members of Parliament, even members of the governing party, have the same responsibility to hold their government to account. It's not just opposition members who have a responsibility to do this. All members of Parliament, even members of the governing party, whoever the governing party may be at one time or another, have a responsibility to do this.
Committees, by nature, ought to be less partisan in the work they do. I believe that Parliament itself, many times—except for one hour a day where it's pretty hard to change that—broadly should be less partisan in the work we do. But committees, I think, should be held to a higher standard in terms of the work they do and in terms of not being partisan.
The responsibility of Parliament and of parliamentary committees to hold government to account for government spending is essential. The current system is not designed to be understood. In fact, if you were to try to design a system to be difficult to understand and to be opaque, you would not be able to do a much better job than what has happened over decades. As a member of Parliament, I can tell you that there are people who have been members of Parliament for years who don't understand the budget and estimates process, and these are smart people, engaged people, and good members of Parliament, who have difficulty understanding what is a ridiculously opaque and unnecessarily complex and illogical system.
The answer is that at some point we should in fact have a system that not just members of Parliament—and all parliamentarians, as I include senators in that—but the general public can understand. That should be the objective. I view this as an evergreening process. These are changes we want to make now, but as we move forward, I want this to be something that, on an ongoing basis, we work on to strengthen accountability of government for spending to Parliament.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
Francis Drouin Liberal Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
I have one more question with regard to the timeline. There were some issues raised with the April 30 timeline, and now I see that you're willing to make some changes for two years. Maybe to help this committee understand that, what's the transition period that you must go through over the two years? Why two years and not one year or three years?
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS
I've been reminded by Yaprak that it's actually a transition over a year and four or five months, given that the budget is only a few months away. I've had this discussion. As ministers, we work closely with our departments and officials. We have very good officials, and I've pushed very hard on this. I am completely satisfied with the response, so I'm going to ask Yaprak to speak to this.
These are very significant changes in the operations of government. In changing something that has evolved over decades, if we're going to succeed and get a good result from this, we need to take the time to get it right.
I'd ask Yaprak to speak to that.
November 3rd, 2016 / 12:10 p.m.
Yaprak Baltacioglu Secretary of the Treasury Board Secretariat, Treasury Board Secretariat
The programs and initiatives that are in the budget versus others that make it into the main estimates require a different level of detail and a different level of preparation. For anything that is in the main estimates, or any of the estimates, we make sure that the program design is there. We make sure that Treasury Board has gone through all of the program details and departments are ready to implement those programs the moment Parliament gives them the money.
Right now the next budget is sometime in the spring. Depending on when it's going to be, we basically have four to five months. Departments are working on their budget proposals, but they're working at what they have been doing all these years, at higher levels for Finance's consideration.
The first budget will be trying to catch up to what is happening. Hopefully, we'll get a quite a lot of them in the main estimates. The year after will be our first and only year to get the whole system aligned and work the kinks out of it so that the year after we will go into an April deadline for the main estimates. You basically have one full year and the remaining months of this year for transition.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Francis Drouin Liberal Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON
When Finance prepares the budget, and the departments ask for proposals, is there going to be a culture shock? Finance is usually very secretive internally with their budget. Is that going to require departments to share more information in order to get the main estimates ready in time?
12:15 p.m.
Secretary of the Treasury Board Secretariat, Treasury Board Secretariat
My colleague from Finance Canada can also talk about this.
Over the last two or three years we actually have made quite a lot of progress in terms of working together. Of course we're committed to budget secrecy. Of course we should allow the government to make the proper decisions, but there has been very close co-operation between Finance and Treasury Board.
We have to involve the whole of the ministry, all of those departments, to actually do the detailed work. That's the part we're going to have to work a little harder on over the next year and a half.
Mr. Leswick can elaborate.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
12:15 p.m.
Nicholas Leswick Assistant Deputy Minister, Economic and Fiscal Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Absolutely, Mr. Chair.
I really don't have a lot substantive to add, just that the nexus between the Treasury Board Secretariat, Treasury Board ministers, and our Minister of Finance in terms of budget decision-making, and departments as well in terms of submitting proposals that are well costed, that ecosystem needs to be well oiled and well functioning for us to meet our objectives as the president speaks to today. Absolutely.
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
12:15 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Thanks for joining us again.
If it makes you feel better, Minister, I'll let you know that, unlike that of my young cohort over there, your time in Parliament doesn't even scratch half my life.
I think we all agree on the need to promote transparency of the budget process and the need for alignment between the estimates and the budget.
I have to say, though, that I am still a bit apprehensive about modifying the Standing Orders before we adjust the corresponding behaviour when it comes to creating the budget and presenting the main estimates. Your predecessor, Tony Clement, noted several times in the discussions of the 2012 budget that reforms didn't require a change in the rules necessarily, but rather a change in the coordination of the budgetary process. I think that's the path I'm going down.
Changing the Standing Orders is quite an exceptional issue, and I think you've now recommended changing a second one to allow time to study the documents. We're now changing two Standing Orders. These rules governing the House are, obviously, very important. They supersede the government of the day. Changing them is monumental and substantial. We just want to underscore the scale of the proposal. Changing the Standing Orders is not something that we should just throw out, that “Oh, we have one day to meet the committee of the whole. We'll just do another change of the Standing Orders.” I think that sets a very bad precedent.
Is it the most proper way to change the Standing Orders so that the budget and estimates can be aligned, when there's nothing that says we can't change the alignment right now?
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS
There are a couple of things I wanted to address in what you said to Mr. McCauley. We think the changes we're proposing are very important—and this is not about one government. We really believe this is about the long term, in looking not only at the 2012 report by this committee, but also at other examples. The Australian example is one of the ones we've looked at closely. This is more than a change that ought to be subject to the whims and the power of one government. This is something that we're engaging Parliament with. We believe that it warrants a change in the Standing Orders, and having the flexibility, whereby we're being totally transparent about the operational challenge for the first two budgetary and estimates cycles over the next year and four or five months, from April 30 going to the following March 31. This reflects both the operational challenges in doing what is a very significant change within the government, but it also adheres completely to the principle that's guiding us, namely a better engagement of Parliament around the spending of government and the budget and estimates process.
I've talked to Tony Clement about this. The broad changes we're proposing are consistent with his views of the direction we're going. I think this is something that we all ought to understand: the importance of strengthening the accountability of government to Parliament in the fundamental area of government spending.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Thank you for that. I think we all agree about the need for transparency and a better understanding of the estimates. There are people around this table who are accountants and say that it's difficult to understand.
You've mentioned that there is no need to table a budget in any year. I think it was 2002-03 when we didn't table a budget. We seem to be putting the cart before the horse. We want the main estimates to align with the budget, but we don't address what happens when you don't have a budget. What I'm also getting at is, why not just move up the alignment? We can make the change without changing doing the Standing Order, if it's that important to do.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS
There are a couple of things here. One is that the budget is not subject to the Standing Orders. What we're proposing here, which I think you'd recognize, is that any government needs to maintain a certain level of flexibility to introduce a budget if there's an external shock to the economy.
Over time, as we make there changes and as we have an opportunity to understand fully the impact of these changes, I think this will drive a much closer—as there has been in recent years—ongoing working relationship between Finance and Treasury Board on these issues. It will also drive and institutionalize a much closer alignment between the budget and the estimates.
I would be open to Brian or Nick adding something to that.
12:20 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Economic and Fiscal Policy Branch, Department of Finance
From a Department of Finance perspective, I think there is clear merit in having a budget in that February to March time period, outlining the spending plans for the Government of Canada, and then an appropriation act or main estimates that follow, reflecting the cash requirements for those spending plans. Without a doubt, that's the paradigm and the objective.
In 12 of the last 15 budgets we've been on that cycle. I think the proposed changes to the Standing Orders buy a little bit more time to meet that goal, to give us some more time, so that those spending plans that are reflected in the budget are incorporated.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
If I could interrupt, because I only have about 30 seconds, can this not just be done by changing the alignment? I don't want to say by “speeding up” your process, but keeping March 30 and changing the alignment time. Instead of moving it back, we could hopefully move it forward again. I'm not advocating a fixed budget date.
12:20 p.m.
Brian Pagan Assistant Secretary, Expenditure Management, Treasury Board Secretariat
Mr. McCauley, let's use last year as an example, when the budget came out on March 23. Under current rules, we had to table the main estimates on March 1. We were presenting the certainty of the estimates in advance of the budget, and then we followed up with supplementary estimates (A), which we tabled on May 10. That shows that we can work very closely with Finance to bring budget items to Parliament very quickly. We had almost 70% of the budget in those supplementary estimates (A).
In this proposal, by tabling on April 30 or May 1, we're bringing the main estimates, which will have the advantage of those budget items, and it's simplifying the process by removing those supplementary estimates (A) in the spring, so that you're focusing on one document and not two.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Scott Brison Liberal Kings—Hants, NS
The other thing, Mr. McCauley, is that for items to be in the main estimates in terms of the current timing of those estimates, they really have to go through Treasury Board approval sometime in January. A budget would have to be sometime in December or something like that. There are timing issues that are addressed by what we're proposing.
Again, you suggested that you would rather see the date be the fiscal year-end. You were more comfortable with that than April 30.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
