Evidence of meeting #149 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was program.
A video is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. MacDonald, for joining us today.
How are the independence and objectivity of the internal audit function maintained?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
I report directly to the deputy minister. We have an internal audit charter that guarantees our independence. It guarantees my access to all the information that I need to do my work. We also have a departmental audit committee charter that gives the independent departmental audit committee access to the documentation that it needs to do its work.
My independence is assured by my reporting relationship with the deputy minister and in the actions that I take as the chief audit and evaluation executive within the department in terms of not being part of management decisions that I could take ownership of that are beyond my purview.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Does the committee also do some of the work to make sure there's more oversight?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
We have an audit committee that meets at least four times a year. It provides advice to the deputy minister on the functioning of the internal audit function and provides the deputy minister with advice on anything that he needs advice on from them.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Can you describe how the audit team supports the department in monitoring progress on the management action plan?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
We have a process in place. Twice a year we do extensive follow-up on all the internal audit recommendations, all of the evaluation recommendations and all of the recommendations done by the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development.
My team reviews the submissions that each branch provides to determine whether those actions can be closed. We present our analysis of these results to the departmental audit committee. The departmental audit committee will recommend the deputy minister's approval if it's satisfied with the information it receives.
October 29th, 2024 / 11:15 a.m.
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
We have about 12 branches in the department.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Can you explain how auditors determine whether a specific initiative provides value for money? How do you measure that?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
Our role within the department is really to look at governance risk and controls to make sure the foundation of program delivery is solid.
We also have an evaluation function that will look at those types of value-for-money or performance issues with respect to whether we're achieving objectives.
The role of the internal audit function is really to look at the governance risk and controls to determine whether or not the processes are in place to support effective program delivery.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
You mentioned in your opening statement that there's an annual planning process that your team undertakes to identify which audit reports you're going to work on that year.
Can you walk us through, in detail, what that process looks like and how you have assurance that you're doing the right projects? How do you choose them?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
Throughout the year, we're doing environmental scanning. We're looking at the different program documents that are being developed to identify areas where internal audits or evaluations may be required.
When we get into the fall period, we take our environmental scanning and we do a review of all departmental documents. Then we send a questionnaire to all executives within the department. After that, we collate all of this information and we meet with every branch head. We get a detailed description of what their priorities are and what their risks are. After all these consultations, we go to our departmental audit committee with a draft list of projects. Those draft lists of projects are reviewed, and they provide advice. We go back and get advice from Treasury Board on some of those horizontal initiatives that we may not know of in our department.
We put this all together and we go back through the committee structure again—the departmental audit committee—which will review it and provide advice to the deputy minister on whether or not to approve it.
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
When you're looking at the continuous environmental scanning throughout the year, this process normally takes place between September and January.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Can you talk a little about the merits and drawbacks of designing programs to operate primarily through grants and contributions rather than through other funding mechanisms?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
In my role as the chief audit executive in the department, my job would really be to analyze what the department is doing in this regard rather than to make determinations on how this is done. This is more up to the deputy minister and the program ADMs, who would decide program design and implementation issues. It would be our job to go in and review whether these are being done effectively.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
Can you talk a bit more broadly about the environmental and climate objectives and talk about how auditors determine whether a specific initiative aligns with the government's broader environmental climate objectives?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
Again, our role is really to look at and to audit what is happening in the department and how they're achieving their objectives. We coordinate our work with the commissioner of the environment.
The commissioner of the environment, as you know, has done a lot of audits in our department over the last three to four years—about six to eight a year. The commissioner of the environment is really looking at how we're implementing some of our programs, and our internal audit and evaluations are also providing information to management on how they can improve the processes that are maybe not working as well.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
With respect to the potential of having efforts duplicated, is there a mechanism that you use to avoid that?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
Do you mean in terms of our internal audit work?
Director General, Chief Audit and Evaluation Executive, Department of the Environment
I have regular bilats with, actually, the audit principal at the commissioner of the environment, who's doing most of the audits in our department, so that we can coordinate.
I'll give you an example: When they were doing an audit of contaminated sites, we were also doing an evaluation of contaminated sites at that time. We wanted to make sure that we weren't going to do the same work, so the commissioner of the environment team picked a different angle, and then we picked a different angle. Now the work is complementary, but not duplicative.
Liberal
Parm Bains Liberal Steveston—Richmond East, BC
I have a quick one.
When the final list of projects is presented to the departmental audit committee and when the deputy minister reviews approval, is there senior management or a team after that, once it leaves the committee? What are the final steps?
