Mr. Chair, I would first like to thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today about Statistics Canada's priorities and challenges.
Statistics Canada is well known for regular publication every year of a wide range of high-quality economic, social, and environmental data, from gross domestic product to crime rates, from employment to inflation, from post-secondary graduations to field-crop production. These data support the decision-making of governments, business, unions, civil society, and even individual Canadians. Our stakeholders demand that data be both consistent and comparable over time, yet responsive to emerging needs. We work collaboratively with provincial and territorial governments, other stakeholders, and with international organizations and other national statistical offices to meet these challenges. For our most impactful data, we pre-announce publication dates and religiously meet them. Maintaining this continuous stream of decision data remains our major focus.
This year, of course, is a special year in the cycle of statistical production. It is the year in which we conduct the censuses of population and agriculture. For 2016, the census of population returns to a comprehensive and fully mandatory program. Exceptionally, one in four households will be asked to complete the long-form census. The 2016 program will make greater use of administrative data to reduce the burden on Canadians of responding. It will also make greater use of social media to promote the census. We hope and expect that this year about two-thirds of Canadian households will respond to the census via the Internet.
Another plus for the 2016 program is that we expect to release all data from the census of population about 10 months earlier than in previous censuses. The census of agriculture will also be conducted this year and hopes to make some significant gains in Internet response by farm operators.
As I mentioned, Statistics Canada's program must evolve to meet emerging needs. In recent budgets, we've been funded to introduce a triennial survey of household wealth, to generate new statistics to measure the stability of financial markets, to build a new comprehensive price index for new and resale housing, to measure the clean-tech sector, and to determine how best to measure the impact of foreign buyers on residential real estate markets.
Working jointly with other departments, Statistics Canada has made strides in labour market information, developing and implementing a new survey of job vacancies and wages, which has now begun publishing data. We have also fielded a pilot survey on children's health that will fill a significant gap in health data. The survey on job vacancies would not have been possible without direct funding from Employment and Social Development Canada, and the survey on child health would not have been possible without the assistance of Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada.
Statistics Canada also works to increase its efficiency and reinvests savings in the statistical program. In the past year we invested in the expanded and improved statistics on the environment, on energy, and on globalization.
Rising to the challenge raised by the Auditor General in his May 2014 report, we have developed new techniques for estimating small area data, and we'll soon be applying these techniques to generate a wide variety of small area data on new subjects.
Beyond these success stories, there are still gaps where new partnerships and resources are needed to make progress. One example is the digital economy and innovation. Some work has been done on an ad hoc basis, but a more regular and consistent program is needed.
Academic researchers are pleading for Statistics Canada to resume conducting longitudinal surveys that follow children, youth, workers, immigrants, and seniors through time, as some policy questions can only be addressed in this way. Longitudinal surveys are, however, expensive and require time to yield their full potential. Better information about life-cycle transition, such as transitions from school to the labour market, or from work to retirement, and from early old age to the very advanced years of aging, are of particular interest to researchers and to policy-makers.
I mentioned efficiency earlier, and I'm pleased to be able to tell you that Statistics Canada has a permanent management process to seek out and exploit opportunities to improve the efficiency, robustness, and responsiveness of its systems and processes. These systems have been thoroughly overhauled over the past five years and have been improved on all three dimensions of efficiency, robustness, and responsiveness.
Despite budget reductions, as I mentioned above, the efficiency gains allowed us to expand the statistical program in critical areas, and to remove all charges for access to standard statistical products and all limitations on their redistribution by others.
Gains in responsiveness allowed the agency to develop and deploy the new job vacancy and wage survey in record time.
One particular strategic investment is being made into the further development of the use of administrative data and other non-traditional data sources, such as big data and satellite telemetry to replace or complement traditional survey research including, potentially, parts of the census. These techniques can reduce the cost of statistical production and reduce the burden on businesses and individuals while permitting data to be generated for very small geographic areas.
Equally important for the health of the statistical system over the past few years, Statistics Canada has identified each year, and program by program, investments required during the next 10 years to ensure the continuity and quality of its outputs. These are things such as system and survey redesign, implementation of new classification standards, and implementation of new international conceptual standards. These investments have been consolidated into a 10-year forward plan with a corresponding financial plan to ensure that the necessary financial resources will be available.
A final priority I'd like to mention is the government's commitment to reinforce the formal independence of Statistics Canada in law. While Canada's statistical system is much envied, one area of weakness that stands out among developed countries is the absence in law of formal protection of the national statistical office's independence. Canada has endorsed guidelines from the United Nations and the OECD that set out principles and recommendations in this regard. Statistics Canada is working on recommendations for consideration by the government that would follow international guidance and bring us in line with other developed countries.
Turning to challenges, the first one I would mention is a very positive one. The government's emphasis on evidence-based decision-making and monitoring of results is giving rise to what I have described as a tsunami of demand for Statistics Canada's services that will temporarily tax our capacity as we adjust to this new level of expectations, but adjust we will.
The second challenge at the forefront of our thoughts is the impact on data quality of declining household survey response rates. This is a phenomenon throughout the developed world for both public sector and private sector survey organizations. It reflects both greater difficulty in contacting households and the faster pace of modern lives which affects the willingness of Canadians to participate. We're tackling this issue through a combination of improved survey processes, new response channels, application of behavioural economic theory, improved survey design, and greater use of administrative data to displace or shorten surveys.
The final challenge that's very front of mind for us at the moment is the temporary decline in the effectiveness of our informatics support. Statistical agencies are essentially applications of informatics. Every stage requires intensive informatics to actually carry out the work. There has been some degradation in the level of support that we've been receiving, and we're working on this issue with our partners.
I believe I've pretty much exhausted my time, so I'd like to close by thanking you again for for this opportunity to address the committee on the work of Statistics Canada.