Evidence of meeting #5 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 43rd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was digital.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
The 20,000 people you mentioned are all public servants. They are within the different departments, as well as the ones represented here.
Conservative
Ziad Aboultaif Conservative Edmonton Manning, AB
They are supporting the 18,000-plus applications. How many of these applications does the government run?
Some of them are over 30 years old. Out of the 18,000 applications, how many are we still dealing with at this point in time?
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
I will ask my officials to add to my comments, but my understanding is that those 18,000 applications are currently employed. Part of why we have a Minister of Digital Government is to move forward in being more effective in how we use information technology.
Conservative
Ziad Aboultaif Conservative Edmonton Manning, AB
Thank you.
To add to my question, how many of the applications are 30 years old and older, and how many public-facing applications are more than 10 years old?
Liberal
Acting Chief Information Officer of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Sure. I might need to get back to you on exact numbers on this.
The applications are generally run out of departments. These applications are being used for all sorts of different things and tasks. We track overall application health, and we can certainly return with more information on the overall application health.
Conservative
Ziad Aboultaif Conservative Edmonton Manning, AB
How many of the Government of Canada applications can Canadians access through their mobile services? Do you have any idea?
Acting Chief Information Officer of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Not off the top of my head.
Conservative
Ziad Aboultaif Conservative Edmonton Manning, AB
I'll go back to my figure of 20,000 public employees. I would rely on the minister to answer the question: What does that represent as a percentage of total employees in the public sector?
Liberal
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Tom Lukiwski
Mr. Aboultaif, I'm sorry but we're completely out of time.
I want to give an opportunity for Madame Vignola to speak.
You only have one minute, Madame, but please go ahead.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
According to your mandate letter, you are tasked with identifying all core and at-risk IT systems and platforms.
How is that work coming along? When can we see the report on that identification exercise?
Acting Chief Information Officer of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
That's what we talked about regarding core and at-risk services in response to an earlier question.
As we mentioned, we are now conducting an application health review. This involves large systems that are at risk. We have just set up a deputy minister committee and started working on the planning process with the minister.
I hesitate to provide a definite date, since we're in the planning stage.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
That's fine.
Mr. Bilodeau, you said earlier that you had an application health file.
Would that file be readily available for consultation and analysis?
Acting Chief Information Officer of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
We would be able to provide that information. There is an application that departments use to give us information on the health of their applications.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Tom Lukiwski
Thank you very much.
My apologies to the committee.
I inadvertently omitted or forgot to give Mr. Kusmierczyk his three minutes.
Sir, the three minutes are yours.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Mr. Chair, thank you very much.
Minister, you mentioned in your remarks that CDS is working closely to improve the experience of Canadians with disabilities. We know how challenging and frustrating even simple surveys online can be for people who have disabilities.
How does accessibility play a role within CDS and how do we measure how we're doing to improve accessibility?
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
It's a huge priority for our government as a whole to have more inclusive services and to encourage people of all abilities to be as productive as possible.
One thing we're doing as a government through SSC is that we have a program called the accessibility, accommodation, and adaptive computer technology program. The objective is that all the tools that public servants use should be able to be used by people with all accessibility challenges. We have public servants making sure the equipment is usable.
Even in your MP office, for example, your equipment could be used by someone who has a visual or hearing impairment. In the recent budget 2019, we've asked for more funding to expand that program so the AAACT team can do further training of other public servants who have the goal of accessibility improvements.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
That's a perfect segue to my next question.
What funding is available to improve accessibility in our department?
Liberal
Denis Bombardier Chief Financial Officer, Shared Services Canada
The funding that was made available to us in budget 2019, as the minister alluded to, was $2.7 million per year on an ongoing basis.
Chief Financial Officer, Shared Services Canada
We're working with the funding that's been allocated to us.