Evidence of meeting #61 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 rcmp.
A video is available from Parliament.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Well, had you approached it differently, it even might have gone differently. That's just my opinion.
Commr Bob Paulson
Okay. Well, we're three years into the plan, and the place isn't sinking and nothing's on fire.
It's valuable criticism. It's good, helpful criticism. I accept it as that, and we're working on it. We've accepted those things. We're going to implement them. We're not going to give short shrift to any of those recommendations. All we wanted is a little dignity to have our position understood on how this thing unfolded. That's all.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Well, if you want some credit for the things that were done right, absolutely.
NDP
David Christopherson NDP Hamilton Centre, ON
Well, I agree, you should be seeing some dignity, and we'd like our security people around here to be shown some dignity, too, in the negotiations that are going on, if we're going to have a rather wide-yielding discussion about this. They'd like to see some respect—
NDP
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Okay. The time is up. We'll go to Ms. Mendès.
I'm sorry. We have Ms. Shanahan and then Ms. Mendès.
Liberal
Brenda Shanahan Liberal Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC
Thank you, Chair.
Thanks to you, Commissioner and Auditor General, and to your teams, for being here today.
Coming in on the end of this, I feel strongly that we have come through something during this session, and it's very apropos that it's about mental health, because a few years ago nobody was talking about mental health, and now everyone is talking about it. You took the initiative in 2014 in an environment that I can imagine was not amenable, either externally or internally, to doing this kind of work. Kudos to you on that.
That said, I think we can all learn something from a session such as this. As members of this public accounts committee, we rely on the Auditor General and his team for the integrity of the work they do. Questioning the data collection methods is not helpful, but it is something that we do need to bear in mind: the knife cuts both ways.
That said, this is not at all about “gotcha”—certainly not the way I feel, and I know we've had discussions on this. This is really about taking what has been a process over time.... The Auditor General can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe there's a two-year or 18-month process, usually, from the audit to preparing the report. Your responses are there. There is time to have the report scheduled and to have it publicized that we've decided to hold the meeting, and then there's an action plan reported. That action plan goes forward in time, and we reserve the right to come back and request updates, so please regard it in that light. This is really a management tool, and it's only meant to be constructive criticism in every way, shape, and form.
That said, my question was partially answered before. I was concerned about recommendation 4.43 from the AG's office on the preparation of the business plan. In the action plan, it does say that the completion date is June 30, 2017. Where are you in that business plan? What can you tell us about that?
Mr. Dubeau may be able to answer that.
D/Commr Daniel Dubeau
Thanks for the question.
At this point, to create our business plan, we've now engaged all the health offices across the country—they're decentralized—to understand what the issues are and where the biggest gaps are so that we can start building on the gaps and asking what resources we need on the ground.
Two years into the strategy—and Joanne is correct in picking this up—we've learned a lot about where the needs are, and now it's, “Okay, then, how do we address these needs?” That's where we are on that. We have the team, a working group, working on this with our divisions to put together this business case so that we can actually come down to how many resources that equates to, because it will mean resources.
Keep in mind, though, that when we talk about resources with our provincial counterparts, we have to get involved with our contracting partners, because they fund those resources too, so there is quite a lengthy process before we actually get the resources on the ground, but yes, we're going to land in June saying, “What do we need to get this working to start with?”
Liberal
Brenda Shanahan Liberal Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC
Yes. An important part of the equation is identifying those resources.
The other thing—and this is a theme that has come up a number of times in other departments—is the quality of data collection. That's where there was a difference of opinion, but your own data collection was not adequate, so we need to address that.
Perhaps, Commissioner, you or one of your team can address where you are at now in data collection.
Commr Bob Paulson
I'll start, and maybe Dan can add to this.
Even in the course of the audit, there were some sensitivities identified around how we are able to extract and make judgments on the back of what is the very personal and private information contained in some of these medical files. That's one of the challenges of getting a dataset that informs management's reaction to changes in the organization. We're working with our divisions to try to overcome those and make sure that our employees are reassured, because there is a school of criticism around how the organization manages private and personal information vis-à-vis their jobs. It's a very difficult challenge.
Maybe Dan can speak to some of the things they're doing around the data.
D/Commr Daniel Dubeau
In the short term, once again, the disability managers and the advisers in play would be part of the role to make sure that we start documenting the data. Unfortunately, right now, much of the data we have is paper-based, which doesn't suit our needs. By 2018, we're hoping to have, depending on contracting and everything else, and on the market, another software purchase that we can plug into our human resources system. That would just be for case management, where you'd have a lot more data and it would be more electronic, and then you can start pulling up trends and ensuring that privacy is protected in there. That's a gap that we have found: the system we currently use doesn't allow that type of information to be captured. So we're going to purchase one from a provider. It's disability management software that health professionals will be able to use. Since we are using public health care, we still have the issue of how do you interface? When I go to see my doctor, and my doctor writes something on the file, how do we get it back into my organization? We just want the occupational stuff. We don't want the other personal stuff, we just want the occupational stuff.
We still have some work to do on that, but it's where we're going with the data, the integrity piece.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kevin Sorenson
Thank you.
Our time is up, but I'm at the committee's disposal here. Mr. Christopherson wants one more question. We have the last half hour for committee business, and there are some things we have to do on the report and on the question.
What's the consensus of the crowd? Do you want to carry on, or do you want to shut this down right now?
Conservative
Conservative
Matt Jeneroux Conservative Edmonton Riverbend, AB
And then you need half an hour for committee business?
Conservative