Public Accounts Committee on April 16th, 2013

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Okay, let's shorten them.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Okay, you want to shorten them.

Let's try this: a three-minute round, one from each caucus. Are you okay with that as the motion? Great. Let's just move to that. I think we've had enough debate, but I will respect anyone who wants the floor. Hearing none, then I'll call for the vote. All those in favour of the motion, please indicate.

(Motion agreed to)

In rotation, who's first on the government side?

Mr. Hayes, you have the floor, sir.

[Bryan Hayes, Conservative, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

This question hasn't been answered yet, at least to my knowledge, unless I missed it. It's understood from the Auditor General that the government has not assessed the impact of our implementing the government action plan. That became very clear.

My colleague Mr. Williamson asked our recipients about the risk factors they put in place. But I want to ask each of our recipients: what is thus far the impact of the changes incorporated on you as a recipient? I don't believe anybody has asked that question, and that was one of the recommendations that came forward. I think it's a fair question that probably should have been asked earlier.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Okay. Who wants to take a stab at that? Don't all rush at once.

[Tom Scrimger]

I'll have to turn it over to my colleagues in the departments, but any of you can start off.

[Carlo Beaudoin]

I'd like to clarify the question. What do you mean by the impact on us?

[Bryan Hayes, Conservative, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Well, in 2008 there was the action plan. The government had a responsibility. This was put forward to you, and I want to understand what the impact of that action plan has been on you as a recipient.

[Carlo Beaudoin]

Okay. As a recipient department, I think the impact has been positive for us at the health agency. We've worked much more broadly with our partners within the health portfolio and also within the broader government to put together tools.

We're working actively on a system now with AANDC and Health Canada to give us better tools to manage these files. We're working on the web processes as well to give better access to our recipients.

So I would say it's positive. It's a change in how we manage things. It's a complete change in how we view our recipients and our relationship with the recipients.

[Bryan Hayes, Conservative, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you.

[Nancy Gardiner]

I would say that from our perspective it was an excellent opportunity. The department developed a departmental action plan to respond to the request, and it was the beginning, actually, of improving the relationships we have with our stakeholders and improving the processes we have in our department. We put in place service standards, standardized processes, and an engagement strategy with stakeholders.

We've continued that on and developed standardized processes for our recipients, in terms of application processes and standardized agreements. Our department is very large, and there were probably about 30 programs across the department that used different processes. So I think just putting that standardization in place in the department was a benefit for stakeholders as well as for ourselves.

Now we're moving into an online environment, so that's another bonus, and I think our stakeholders have said to us that that's something they're really looking forward to.

[Bryan Hayes, Conservative, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you.

[Donald MacDonald]

From the perspective of Western Economic Diversification, it's been very positive over the time period. As Mr. Scrimger referenced earlier, it's enabled us to concentrate on applying an intelligent risk management approach to fairly assess what is high, medium, and low risk, act accordingly, and tailor our interventions with those recipients accordingly. This would enable us to notice a difference between high and low risk, as evidenced in the report, where we've seen a drastic reduction in our recipient audit costs, and then obviously the administrative burden that then flows to those recipients in that time period. It would also allow the movement to the adoption of service standards and our review of those service standards and what they're telling us, to be able to look at continuous improvement of our administration of grants and contributions. Finally, the move to online applications and eventually the online claims process will ease the burden.

In addition, we've seen greater collaboration across all the regional development agencies with like organizations that are doing very similar delivery across Canada. We've been able to share best practices. Informally, we've set up that opportunity to share best practices and look at other things departments are doing that we can learn from as well, in addition to the work that's being led by the interdepartmental committees.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Thank you, Mr. MacDonald.

Very quickly, Ms. Stimpson, please.

[Sue Stimpson]

Very quickly, it helps focus CIDA on the work that we knew we had to do anyway to consolidate, simplify, and streamline. Probably the single most important factor was risk-based administration and risk-based management of our grants and contributions. We are making those intelligent decisions and taking the administrative burden into account when we're making those decisions on the management.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Great. Thank you.

[Bryan Hayes, Conservative, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

You're welcome, Mr. Hayes.

We'll move over to Mr. Allen. You have the floor, sir.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Ferguson, when you look at 2.47, 2.48, and 2.50 on program changes, it seems a few departments seemed to have a handle on getting ahead of the curve, if you will. In 2.49, you talked about HRSDC as a place that was out talking to stakeholders, and they were doing some stuff. They may not have been doing the exact measurements that were needed, but certainly they were out talking to folks.

Is that your sense, that at least it looked as if there was a forward-moving aspect to that as far as getting to that point?

[Frank Barrett]

Yes, we could say that.

In terms of consulting with the stakeholders and the recipients, they were effectively talking with them. There was communication on the loss of records on file.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

The obvious question then comes back to Mr. Scrimger.

Since that's one of the departments identified in the report, did you look to that department as a model or template and say we're the overarching ones at Treasury Board Secretariat? Since we're the overarching player in all of this, did you look at them and say they're doing a pretty good job, we should do this? Of course, the subsequent question is, if they were doing it, why weren't the rest?

[Tom Scrimger]

The Auditor General examined five departments, and some 28 are heavily involved in this business. I would suggest that if he had a broader scope, he would probably have found similar activities in the other departments and agencies as well.

To keep my answer brief, I think sharing best practices became one of the elements of the action plan. Through a number of different mechanisms, the Auditor General has acknowledged the good work that was done to do that. Certainly, a number of departments and agencies are now combining forces when they share joint recipients, to lessen the burden in that sense.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

If you're looking at me for time, it's a good opportunity for me to mention that the bells are now ringing. It's a half-hour bell. In my view, there's no reason why we can't conclude with Mr. Allen and Mr. Byrne and then adjourn and join our colleagues for the vote in the chamber.

Is that agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, NDP, David Christopherson]

Thank you.

Mr. Allen, you still have the floor, sir.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

I am going to share my time with Mr. Giguère.

I'll give him the final question.