Public Accounts Committee on June 5th, 2008

[David Sweet, Conservative, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Okay.

We'll go to Mr. Lussier.

[Marcel Lussier, Bloc, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Chairman, we will also support the friendly amendment moved by Mr. Williams. I would simply like to add a small correction to the French version. The word blood is spelled sans and should be spelled sang.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you very much, Mr. Lussier.

I think we've had a debate.

Colleagues, we're through here in two weeks. I would expect that when we come back on September 15, within two or three weeks--maybe a month--we will be having a meeting on the public accounts. I will bring it up with the steering committee and we will follow up. This will be part of the so-called public accounts meeting, to have an examination on this.

All in favour of the motion, as amended and subamended, please raise your hands.

(Motion agreed to)

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

The final item, colleagues, is to review and approve the minutes of the steering committee that was held on Monday this week. That has been circulated, and it basically sets the schedule for the next four meetings this year.

I'll review it very quickly. Next week, on June 10, we have draft reports. We're going to spend the first hour dealing with the CAIS program. Hopefully we'll conclude it in less than an hour. Then we're going to go back to the acquisition of leased office space. Then on June 12--

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Is there any end to that thing?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I don't know, Mr. Williams. That's entirely in the hands of the committee.

There are draft reports again on the 12th. On the 17th, we have scheduled “support for overseas deployment”, from the May report, and then on the 19th, which of course is somewhat speculative, we're back to draft reports.

We've also circulated the schedule for the first month or so in September. Again, these were chapters that the steering committee recommended: aboriginal affairs; surveillance, detention, and removal of individuals. You can see that there.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Mr. Chair, it says the committee resumes consideration of the study of the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer on October 21. What are we resuming? I thought we were finished with that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

We didn't really close it off, Mr. Williams. In fact, there was some talk of calling some other people. Again, that would be somewhat speculative, but at the time we actually talked about continuing that debate.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

I would move that we delete that.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Mr. Chairman, if I am not mistaken, the last time we had a report from the subcommittee, when someone asked about the number of existing draft reports, I thought I understood that there were about 10 of them.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I'm going to ask the analyst to answer that question. They're not all done, but I'll get a quick answer from the analyst.

Alex.

[Alex Smith, Committee Researcher]

We have prepared the CAIS program and Place Victoria for next Tuesday. We also have completed, and it is in the process of translation, a report on human resources at DFAIT, Foreign Affairs and International Trade, and the estimates. We had a hearing on the OAG report on plans and priorities and DPR.

We have not yet completed reports on the management of user fees. The report on securing government information will have to be amended. We also have the greening of government operations, which will have to be written. So we have a few outstanding reports.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Do these reports have to be dealt with in any particular order? Basically, what is the order? How do we establish the priorities?

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I am asking this question because we cannot avoid the fact that the Place Victoria report could be a long one, because of the way it started out. However, I have no problem with this, but if you want...

[Brian Fitzpatrick, Conservative, Prince Albert, SK]

It's an old one.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I understand why, given the amendments that the government proposes.

Nevertheless, if we want to clear the ground, to move ahead and reduce the backlog of reports, has the subcommittee envisaged tabling the ones that you mentioned this morning? At least three of these reports may be ready for tabling and they could probably be adopted much more promptly.

If such is not the case, I agree that we should do what was proposed. Nonetheless, Mr. Chairman, let me emphasize that if we carry on in the same way as we did during the most recent attempt to adopt the report on chapter 7, things could get very drawn out.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

You're quite right, Mr. Bélanger. I should point out that the steering committee also agreed that we're going to meet every day during July and August on Place Victoria. Is that agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

I take your point, Mr. Bélanger.

Mr. Lake, then Mr. Williams.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

Further to Mr. Bélanger's point, I don't understand, when we have other reports we have to do, why we have chapter 2. Why are we going to undertake a new study that we're not going to get to? It's going to be four months before we get to the draft reports on it, but on June 17 we have this chapter 2.

I would move that we move that to draft reports. Let's work on draft reports, clear our backlog, and come back with a fresh agenda in the fall.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Let's understand that the order in which we deal with them might be of some significance, in terms of getting through the backlog.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

We may do better than we think.

Mr. Williams, and then I'll adjourn.

[John Williams, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Item 12, Mr. Chair, “That on October 28, 2008, the Committee commence consideration of a study on Performance Pay in the Federal Public Service.” What's going on here?

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

That's one item, Mr. Williams. As you know, this has come up before and we want to have a look at it. This is an issue that is ill understood by parliamentarians. They have this at-risk pay; they have bonuses. It comes up at every hearing. Every time we have a problem, either you ask the question or I ask the question, or someone asks the question, “Did you get your at-risk pay? Did you get your bonus?” The answer is always yes. We thought it would be good some time in the fall, if we had the time, to--