Evidence of meeting #137 for Public Accounts in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was audits.
A video is available from Parliament.
10:05 a.m.
Liberal
Alexandra Mendes Liberal Brossard—Saint-Lambert, QC
I hope we'll eventually manage to have a clearer portrait.
Thank you for the précis.
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
To carry on, though, I want to make sure I understand this too, because I am bothered by some of what we've heard today.
When Mr. Ferguson made his final submission requesting $10 million, following which he received $8 million....
10:05 a.m.
Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General
The $8 million.... Let me back up.
10:05 a.m.
Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General
For budget 2018, we requested $21 million. We received $8.3 million.
10:05 a.m.
Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General
We went back to request the remainder of what we determined we needed—and I misspoke. I said $10.4 million, but the number he had was $10.8 million.
10:05 a.m.
Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General
He shortened the difference between $21 million and $8 million to $10.8 million and we didn't get that.
10:05 a.m.
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
Had you received it, would it have been enough to ensure that all necessary audits could be completed, that the deficiencies in internal services would be addressed and that the additional responsibilities—the statutory responsibilities that you have been given, including audit responsibilities for the Canada Infrastructure Bank and the audit responsibilities for Trans Mountain Corp....?
Would that amount have done it all, or would we still have been cutting corners, even had you received that requested amount?
10:05 a.m.
Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General
At the risk of putting words in Mr. Ferguson's mouth, I can tell you that had we received the $10.8 million that he requested last summer, our office would have considered ourselves to be properly funded. We would have been able to do the work that was expected.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
Pat Kelly Conservative Calgary Rocky Ridge, AB
In your words, then, you are not adequately funded now.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you.
I think we will probably leave it. I will ask one question. We've talked a fair bit about the five areas that you deemed least important, and I think when Canadians look at the topics that you deemed you wouldn't audit....
Cybercrime, we see more and more cybercrime all the time. If there were an attack here in Canada and your report had said there was a deficiency in this area or in that area, I think it would be troublesome to every Canadian and certainly to every parliamentarian, regardless of which side of the House they sit on.
For the protection of our north, this last week we've had a lot of questions about our north coming from our neighbour to the south—sovereignty of the north and, indeed, protection of the north. That's part of what plays out in sovereignty.
These are topics that are of extreme importance to Canadians, but when you deemed them the least important, was it because they had such good internal audits taking place that in the past there had never been a problem with those, so you looked at it and said that their internal audits are solid and you were generally certain of that?
If I were the head of any department, the fact that there was an audit coming would be an accountability measure that I would always be working forward to. It's as we've said in the past: A certain audit strikes a certain degree of fear into most Canadians, but a department expects it. It's an accountability measure.
What were the criteria around “the least important”?
10:10 a.m.
Interim Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
Any audit we identify is of importance or obviously we would not have identified it.
Facing what we're facing, we have no choice but to reduce the level of effort and reduce the number of audits. We have no choice. We can't do it.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
10:10 a.m.
Interim Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
They would be normal cost.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
10:10 a.m.
Interim Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
Again, I don't have all of the specifics at hand, but I'm 99% sure that all of them would probably fall within the average of any performance audit we normally do.
10:10 a.m.
Interim Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
Some are sometimes bigger, some smaller, but on average they would probably fall in the same range as any other one.
I want all of us to be careful. Lacking other words, Mr. Bergin said “least important”, but at the end of the day, it's not an exact science. We identified all of them; we felt they all needed to be done. At the end of the day, we have to make a choice, a very difficult choice. They should all be done. We've never had this committee say, “Do fewer performance audits”. We have never heard that.
10:10 a.m.
Interim Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General
We feel bad saying to you, sorry, I know you didn't ask for less but you're going to get less. We can't do any magic here.
10:10 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Right.
Is this different from other departments? I'll just throw that out as a kind of question. Should we be viewing the Auditor General's office differently from other departments? I'm sure that other departments didn't get everything that they perhaps asked for. Why is this different?