Thank you, Mr. Chair.
With me today are Annie Boudreau, comptroller general of Canada; and Francis Trudel, associate chief human resources officer.
The comprehensive expenditure review was launched on July 7, 2025. The proposed cuts were to total up to 15% of each organization's review base, which reflected the main estimates for 2025-26.
Departments and their organizations were instructed to target programs and activities that were underperforming, not core to the federal mandate, overlapped with other programs or were not aligned with government priorities.
Savings were also to include operational efficiencies.
The comprehensive expenditure review applied to federally appropriated organizations, including Crown corporations, with certain exceptions, such as agents of Parliament.
There was a lower annual savings target of 2% set for certain organizations, such as the Department of National Defence, the RCMP and the CBSA, due to their mandates and recent investments.
In total, 102 organizations submitted savings proposals. These proposals were reviewed to ensure they didn't compromise the ability of the government to service Canadians or its legal obligations, for example, in respect to official languages. Proposals were also reviewed to avoid negative impacts to the health, safety and national security of Canadians.
Budget 2025, tabled last November, included detailed information on planned reductions by organization. The budget also presented a plan to return the size of the public service to a more sustainable level: from about 368,000 employees in 2024 to approximately 330,000 employees in 2029. This includes a reduction of approximately 16,000 resulting directly from the comprehensive expenditure review, continuing a trend of public service population decrease over the past several years.
Workforce reductions are being managed through attrition and voluntary departures wherever possible.
The proposed early retirement incentive program seeks to support this objective by offering public servants the opportunity to voluntarily leave the public service.
Budget 2025 contained a 40-page annex on planned savings, and additional details will be provided in the organizations' departmental plans, which will be tabled shortly.
Lastly, organizations responded to the Parliamentary Budget Officer's requests for information on savings and impacts on services.
We will continue to share more information as it becomes available.
Very briefly, Mr. Chair, I would like to speak about the comprehensive expenditure review as it applies to the Treasury Board Secretariat as a department.
The Treasury Board Secretariat's budget will be reduced by $58 million, or about 15%, annually by 2028-29. Our workforce at TBS will be reduced by about 300 executive and non-executive positions across all sectors. We are minimizing involuntary departures by leveraging attrition, such as retirements, as much as possible to achieve these outcomes.
As noted earlier, the early retirement incentive program may allow us to further reduce involuntary departures, should it be approved by Parliament.
This concludes my remarks. My colleagues and I look forward to responding to your questions.