To explain it, I have to tell you what happened in 1995. In 1994, the Translation Bureau had an appropriated budget. In 1995, when it was decided to charge for the bureau's services, the parliamentary appropriations that were allocated to the bureau were distributed among all the departments according to their previous use, minus a commission retained by the Treasury Board. This has never changed since 1995, while demand has more than tripled. Since departments don’t know where to find the money, they save as much as they can. One way to save money is to stop having documents translated or to have them translated on request.
I’ll give you an example. My daughter applied for a bilingual position in the public service. She had to request a translation of the job posting and the job description because they hadn't been translated. Incidentally, this happened in the Translation Bureau's home department.