Evidence of meeting #31 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 year.
A video is available from Parliament.
November 3rd, 2016 / 5:20 p.m.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
No department or agency overspent their vote this year. We do disclose that in one of the notes to the financial statements, so it's there for your reference.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you very much.
I think we're getting close to the end here. I guess there are a couple of questions that are maybe not so much for the table but that we have a bit of an interest in.
First of all, for the Auditor General, in the course of an audit or even in the course of going through these public accounts, were you able to identify any weaknesses or potential improvements in terms of internal controls, internal audits, or internal management styles within departments that perhaps should be highlighted or that we should be more aware of, more so than what may be hidden away in the three volumes?
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
In terms of anything that we feel the committee should be aware of, we put that in our audit observations. The important things that we feel the committee should be particularly aware of are in there.
We will also send to individual departments or organizations management letters that deal with more day-to-day things. If we feel that they need to improve some of their practices around recording journal entries or something like that, we will put those things in a management letter that we send to the department. We keep an eye on those from year to year. If it's something of significance and something that we feel that Parliament should be aware of, we will put that in the audit observations, but we will make other observations to the departments.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
One of the things that falls under my responsibility is the internal audit function of the Government of Canada. All internal audits are made public, but if I could make one observation on the most constant theme we bump into, it's lack of documentation.
It's not that a rule was broken, but it's just that the record-keeping wasn't as good as we would like. That's the one that keeps popping up audit after audit.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Now we have got three or four or five others who have said that they would like to have a question. I waited until the end and then took the chair's prerogative to ask a couple of questions, but now hands are shooting up, so I will probably leave it here.
I have one more question to Mr. Matthews. I hope this isn't too long a question, because we only have five minutes left.
I looked to the analysts and they showed me where the line items of P3s were, but how were they accounted for? What's the accounting process for our P3s?
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
All P3s are different. You have to look at it and basically ask whether the government has an asset or not.
In all the cases, the government is often the ultimate risk holder. People talk about P3s being risk-free to government, but you have to look at the deal. The government is the risk holder. More often than not, they end up as an asset on our books, either when it's done or at some point through the project. Generally speaking, they end up as an asset.
The Government of Canada has a few P3s. The B.C. government has a lot more and has more experience, but we have some big ones. I'm going from memory, but I think most of them are in our books as an asset.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Good.
We will take your questions if you can do them in 30 seconds each. Mr. Christopherson, the time clock is running.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Thank you, Chair. I hear you, sir.
My question regards gender-based analysis. How much of what we currently have in front of us would have had that lens? This is looking to the future, I know, but can any of the finance folks give an indication of how quickly we're going to see that? Then when we start getting reports, the answer will be 40%, 60%, and finally 100%.
There's no page to gender-based analysis; I just mean overall. We could start with the comptroller. To what degree do we have gender-based analysis going on now, in terms of what's in front of us, and how much is that going to change over the next few years? Tell us as much as you can.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
That's a tough question to answer, but I'll be quick.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
In theory, it's most or all of what's here, but I think the real question is the quality of the gender-based analysis. It's really a quality issue, as opposed to—
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
It takes me back to the data issue that the Auditor General raised early on. Sorry, go ahead.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I'd just say it's really a question of quality. Things like expenses for national debt aren't going to have gender-based analysis, but real programs should, in theory, all have gender-based analysis. However, I think the quality is the real question.
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
My questions are for Mr. Ferguson and Mr. Matthews. The last time you were here, Mr. Ferguson, I was reminded by the chair that it was for the review of National Defence. There were some areas of concern regarding non-compliance in reporting, either simply not following through or not placing high priority on that.
Mr. Matthews, you mentioned not filling out the documents properly. Is it a matter of ability to fill it out or just an unwillingness to do it?
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I'm not sensing any lack of willingness, and my comment was not specific to National Defence—
Conservative
Todd Doherty Conservative Cariboo—Prince George, BC
No, no, no. I mean in terms of departments overall.
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I think what you'll find is that especially some of the smaller organizations, since they don't have the resources, are wearing multiple hats. They would struggle more than the larger ones to dot the i's and cross the t's.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Mr. Matthews and Mr. Harvey, you have the final say of the public accounts meeting. Have at it.
Liberal
TJ Harvey Liberal Tobique—Mactaquac, NB
In table 5.7 on page 5.12, towards the bottom it identifies “Consolidated crown corporations and other entities”. Atomic Energy of Canada identified a new liability this year of $1.109 billion that wasn't identified in the March 31, 2015 column, but it has shown up there now. It doesn't directly correlate to retirement of Atomic Energy Canada nuclear facilities, so I'm wondering where that figure came from and how that liability is measured for the nuclear facility decommissioning at Atomic Energy of Canada Limited.
Is that all federal debt, and if so, what's the total figure of debt? Do provinces pay a portion of that?
Comptroller General of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
My recollection is that this is all federal, but I'm going to get Diane to weigh in here in a second.
What happened with the Atomic Energy liability is that there was a shift in the accounting standards they followed, and the discount rate is very important there. I believe that responds to the change, but I'm going to see whether Diane has anything to add. If not, we may need to get back to you on that one.