We do annual financial audits of the federal government as well as the three territorial governments, and we do financial statement audits for many territorial corporations and Crown corporations. Those are audit opinions that are given to the boards of directors or to Parliament about whether or not the financial statements accurately present the results of the organization for the year.
I'll tell you that when it comes to the public accounts of Canada, it's really that final accountability loop, so you get to see what was committed in a budget and then, in the financial statements for the year, what actually happened.
Those would be our financial audits. We do about 90 of those every single year.
We also do performance audits. In performance audits, we go into departments and agencies—at times, they include Crown corporations, depending on the program we might be looking at—to determine whether the programs have been managed with due regard to the economy, efficiency and the environment, and whether or not management has put in place ways to measure whether these programs have been effective and provide good value for money for Canadians.
Very closely linked to a performance audit is a special examination. It's about the equivalent of a performance audit, but in a Crown corporation. The parameters of that, however, are dictated by the Financial Administration Act. We must do a special examination for parent Crowns once every 10 years, and it's about processes and whether they have processes in place to safeguard their assets and deliver on their mandate.
We provide all of that to their boards, but we also provide it to Parliament so that you can hold Crowns accountable for managing their assets and delivering against their mandate.
The commissioner of the environment will usually issue performance audits, so he does my job on the sustainable development and environment side. He also has responsibilities arising out of other acts, like the net-zero emissions act and so on, so he provides other reports to Parliament that show whether or not the government is meeting the commitments it has made for sustainable development.