Public Accounts Committee on March 22nd, 2016

[Dominique Francoeur]

I will be a lot happier now knowing ahead of time what I'm going to get, because I will be able to do, for instance, better planning, based on economies of scale. If I know at the beginning of the year exactly what my funding will be, the contracts will reflect the fact that this is the money I am going to spend at such and such a site. As it is now, the department has agreed to doing that, so it will be a lot better for us.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you.

We'll now move back to Ms. Zahid.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Paragraph 5.51 of the AG's report said that software problems contributed to a lack of ready information on the conditions of the housing stock. Paragraph 5.54 also stated that the system has been transitioned to a new platform.

Was this project run internally or externally?

[Dominique Francoeur]

Internally.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Was Shared Services involved?

[Dominique Francoeur]

No.

We have an enterprise resource system. This is our records system. We've had it since the beginning of the agency. That system required a major upgrade, as is normally the case. For the upgrade we dealt with the private sector. We did the upgrade using internal resources as well. That happened in the fall of 2014. We had that system, but the condition assessment was in a separate database. The intent with the new system, the stronger upgraded system, was to bring that under one single system. In the fall of 2015, we brought in the condition assessment by implementing in the new system what we call the condition module of that new system. Now we have all the information under the one single system. This was done in accordance with our plan and was completed in November 2015. We've now made sure that all the employees at the site level, as well as at head office, have been trained to use effectively the new system.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Will you be going on to Shared Services?

[Dominique Francoeur]

No.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

To what extent is on-base barracks housing available to single members to reduce pressure on the housing stock for the families and couples?

[Dominique Francoeur]

It depends at which site, depending on the demographics of the population. Our policy says that we allocate houses based on first-come, first-served, including single members. We serve single members as well, but we're not going to allocate them a big house, obviously. The system is that we serve the members who are knocking at our door for a house, so, depending on the location, we may serve a good portion of the single members by allocating them the smaller houses.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

It seems that the funding mechanisms for the Canadian Forces housing agency, both in terms of the constraints on its use of the rental revenues and its allocation of the capital funds from the Department of National Defence, are constraining the agency's ability to modernize the housing portfolio. I know you have outlined some changes you are undertaking within your framework. Do you feel this is sufficient to provide the needed flexibility?

[Dominique Francoeur]

It will greatly help, yes.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Do you think any other legislative or budget changes should be considered to give you more....

[Dominique Francoeur]

Flexibility?

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Yes.

[Dominique Francoeur]

The agency operates within the department, so I follow all the same regulations, the same procurement rules, and the Financial Administration Act and Treasury Board policies when they apply, and so on. Operating that agency within the department is fine. I have also a little bit more flexibility than other organizations in terms of the level of authority for contracting and that kind of thing. That offers me a little bit of flexibility as well to benefit from economies of scale, such as having larger contracts, and so on.

There might be different models or different things that could offer more flexibility, but that would be part of our assessment when we come up with the policy and the requirements. When we develop service options and things like that, we will explore other alternatives.

[Jaime Pitfield]

If I could add, Mr. Chair, we need the requirements to develop the plan going forward. This is the plan that we're talking about. We need to consult with the private sector to see how the private sector can help, what new ways of doing things are out there in the marketplace, and how, using the private sector as our partner, it can alleviate pressure on the budgets.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kevin Sorenson]

Thank you very much. Those are good questions.

We'll move to Mr. Christopherson, please.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair. I believe I only have a few minutes in this last round.

I have a couple of minor things to start and then one relatively substantive question.

Under your action plan, I'm just curious, under “Expected Final Completion Date” it says, “will require a Treasury Board submission; hence a 2018 vice 2017 deliverable.”

I don't know that expression. Is that a typo? What does that expression mean, “hence a 2018 vice 2017 deliverable”?

[MGen Derek Joyce]

It's a good question, sir.

That is simply a clarification. When the initial assessment was done, we did not anticipate the requirement to go for ministerial approval and require a Treasury Board submission. We've reassessed our timeline. We are now looking at a fall 2018 final policy.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Just help me understand that expression, “hence a 2018 vice 2017 deliverable”.

[MGen Derek Joyce]

You can read it as “rather than”.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

So it's “rather than”; good stuff. I've never run across that before. I learn something every day. Thanks.

I have another quick question. On the next page over, it says, “National Defence will have a long-term residential housing accommodation plan in place one year after it produces a revised accommodation policy (Fall of 2019).”

Is that the fall of 2019 for the completion of the policy, and then a year, or is it the completion of the policy leading to implementation in 2019? I wasn't clear on it.

[Bill Jones]

The policy comes first and the property management plan comes second. Hopefully by the fall of 2019, at the latest, we'll have all the i’s dotted and t's crossed for the property management plan. We can do some of that in tandem, so hopefully it's before that for the property management day-to-day plan.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I have one last question, if I can, Chair.

Under the conclusion, Mr. Auditor General, you state that you concluded that National Defence did not have adequate plans to support the current and future needs of military housing and that because of constraints, it could not spend its funds effectively to modernize the portfolio.

There have been other questions around this. You know we've dealt with this many times with defence budget issues in terms of managing the budgets year over year. Are you satisfied, sir, with the response you've received to that concern?