Government Operations Committee on March 26th, 2026

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

When it comes to the processing of ATIP requests, regardless of any technology used to support this work, all files are reviewed by ATIP professionals to ensure the legal requirements for disclosure are being properly met.

For your further clarification or satisfaction, I'm going to ask my deputy to respond to—

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

We are past our time, I'm afraid, as much as I like hearing from Mr. Matthews.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

I can't get no satisfaction.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

We'll go to Ms. Derksen.

Welcome back to OGGO. The floor is yours for five minutes.

Then we'll do two four-minute rounds and finish with a two-minute round from the Bloc.

Please go ahead.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. It's a pleasure to see you. I know you've joined us at public accounts on numerous occasions.

Public accounts is the committee I normally attend. At public accounts, we're a non-partisan committee. Really, the grand themes of the committee are government accountability in spending, making taxpayer dollars go as far as they can to get the best value and transparency.

Transparency is something that's been brought up numerous times by my colleagues around this table today and by you, yourself, Minister Ali, so I want to give you a chance to comment. You did mention transparency in your opening remarks and in your response to Mr. Gasparro, so I'm interested in hearing more from you about what types of transparency measures and mechanisms you are contemplating implementing in supplementary estimates (C) as a whole.

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

Thank you for the question.

As a new government, we've been very transparent on all main estimates and supplementary estimates.

In budget 2025, there's an annex of 40 pages. The details are there. We also have a website that we update information on regarding the CER and workforce adjustment on a regular basis. If you go to Canada.ca, you'll find all the information there.

We believe in that transparency and fairness, and I'm committed to being transparent to Canadians. Canadians have a right to know where their tax dollars are being spent. Actually, since I have taken over, I've asked my officials to educate Canadians on how we spend their tax dollars. We have done a video on that. I think it's available. Average Canadians need to understand how their tax dollars are being spent and how they are receiving services from their government.

To me, it's very important, and for our new government it's really important to be transparent and to be accountable to Canadians.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Thank you, Minister. I certainly agree with you.

I would like to give you and your officials the opportunity to follow up at a later date to give us more specifics about the mechanisms and procedures you intend to implement. I think that would be a great reassurance to this committee and to Canadians in general.

Is it a fair comment to say that vote 50 spending will be made public?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

Absolutely. The vote funds are there for any urgent needs for our Canadian Armed Forces should they need them, but if they spend any money, it would be approved by the Treasury Board. That report would be given to Parliament and made public. There's nothing to hide. It's the most transparent process. It would be available to Canadians.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Thank you. That's very good to hear.

From what I understand, TBS is requesting $1 billion for the new central vote 50, which is for defence and security initiatives. These are meant to supplement other appropriations to accelerate expenditures relating to defence and national security. Is that correct?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

That's correct.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Okay. Can you illuminate for me how you determined the figure of $1 billion?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

I'm going to ask my deputy to respond for this breakdown, please.

[Bill Matthews]

On the $1 billion, as the President of the Treasury Board already has said, it's a contingency vote.

I want members to appreciate the context here. There's been an acceleration of defence spending and an investment in national defence, and urgency is being stressed. At the same time, we have a system in the Canadian government where departments are not allowed to overspend their vote. It's illegal to overspend what Parliament has authorized.

In a world where we're pushing to accelerate infrastructure, equipment, recruiting, etc., it's hard to land that kind of spending on a dime. If, in the time between when supplementary estimates (C) are finalized and the fiscal year-end, it turns out there's a project that is running ahead of schedule, which is a good thing, we wanted to give access to departments to get that money to pay for the goods and services they receive.

It's a contingency. When it gets used...and I would say that it will not all get used this fiscal year. It was an “up to” amount that was selected. When it gets used, we will publish in the next supplementary estimates how it was actually used.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Thank you. I think you highlight a very important balance that needs to be struck here between urgency and efficiency, given the context we're finding ourselves in and, of course, balancing that against the transparency and accountability that all of us need to meet as guardians of taxpayer dollars. Thank you for highlighting that.

Is that my time, Chair? Okay.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thanks.

We'll go to Mr. Patzer for four minutes and then Mr. Gasparro for four. We'll finish up with Madame Gaudreau for two minutes.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

Thank you very much.

Minister, we were talking about some of the research council issues here. I'm going I ask a question first, and then we'll get into the research side of things. Do you consider a 34:1 return on investment a good return?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

I'm sorry. Can you elaborate a bit more, please?

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

For one dollar spent, you get $34 back. Is that a good return on investment?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

I don't know in which world you would get that return.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

Do you think that's a good return on investment?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

That looks unrealistic.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

The Department of Agriculture has research stations. The value of those research stations is that for every dollar that is spent, there is a 34:1 return on investment on those research dollars. Agriculture is one in nine jobs in Canada. It is one of our largest, if not the largest, exports and GDP developers in our economy. Those research stations, because of the work they do in scaling up crops, provide, as has been verified by the University of Saskatchewan and other universities, that figure of 34:1, yet you're cutting there.

Agriculture Canada is hitting that 15% reduction. We are shutting down the Indian Head research station, the Scott research station and the Lacombe research station. There are cuts to other research stations across the country. You as the President of the Treasury Board are trying to obviously get spending under control, yet the only department that can brag about having a real return on investment for taxpayers and getting value out of the work it's doing is the one that's having the most devastating cuts. Does that make sense to you?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

Chair, I see that on the one side, our colleague from the Conservatives says you're spending too much. On the other side, when you're trying to find savings, you find different excuses.

On this, every department was asked. It's not Treasury Board who is deciding what will happen in agriculture. The department was asked to submit or find savings where programs were underperforming.

[Jeremy Patzer, Conservative, Swift Current—Grasslands—Kindersley, SK]

Did you approve that?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton—Chinguacousy Park, ON]

It is the minister responsible for that department who would have submitted the plan. If you have any concerns—