Public Accounts Committee on April 15th, 2026

[Karen Hogan]

You would know that when we did the audit on the Canada Revenue Agency call centre, we had some concerns with the contract there, so we started that audit. That's one example of our own audit leading us to go somewhere else. Most of the audits that we pick are either things that we believe are a high risk or things that are so important to Canadians and the government that we should look at them.

We listen to parliamentarians. You write to us often, and we might pick topics that you have suggested because they're of interest to Canadians. We do an environmental scan on what our polls across the country are saying Canadians are interested in. We're always trying to adjust and be nimble in our audits. I'm not sure I would call them “red flags”, but I think they're areas that we believe are relevant and pertinent to Canadians.

[Ned Kuruc, Conservative, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Do you have any follow-up audits planned?

[Karen Hogan]

That's an interesting one. Normally, we would say that we'll follow up an audit five or 10 years later, but as you'll see, one of the metrics in our departmental results report is that we measure how many of the recommendations we believe have been successfully implemented a few years after our audit. We don't like how low that is.

This year we are intentionally starting.... We have to start small, but we've chosen to go in and follow up on prior year recommendations. We went back to 2020, 2021 and 2022 and picked six organizations we audited. We're going to issue a report to you on how they are doing. Then our goal will be, in the next year, to bring that to almost 75% of the recommendations we've issued, until we get to 100%. Then we will try to resource that every year so that we can keep doing that and give you an online portal to search for it. We hope that this will help bring attention to recommendations that are just not being acted on.

[Ned Kuruc, Conservative, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

Mr. Osborne, you have the floor for five minutes, please.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

Thank you.

I want to join the parade saying “thank you”, as the government appreciates the initiatives you've taken under the comprehensive expenditure review, even though you were not required.

Adding on to that, if there was an AG looking at the AG, what would the audit criteria be for that entity to look at you?

[Karen Hogan]

There are going to be a whole bunch of AGs looking at the AG very soon. That is what our peer review is. We bring in other countries to come and audit us.

There is an actual international approach to peer reviews that is agreed to. With the lead country, we will decide where to go. Do we want them to look at our audit operations, our methodology, our approach, our use of technology, or do we want them to look at our own office's functioning?

We're in that design phase right now, or that planning phase, with some of the countries that are going to support us, but they would use internationally recognized standards. It's not really an audit. It's more of a peer review, and they provide advice on how to deliver better to Parliament.

Do you want to jump in?

[Andrew Hayes, Deputy Auditor General, Office of the Auditor General]

Yes, if I can just add to that.

One of the things that the peer review provides is an opportunity for us to learn from other organizations worldwide that audit national governments. Quite frankly, what we're hoping from the peer review is that we can leverage some of the best practices that they have. Maybe they'll come in and say that we're doing something that they've run into problems with, so we should stop doing that and maybe do this instead.

That peer review is going to be a learning opportunity, both for us and for the countries that are coming to look at us.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

In your opening remarks, you talked about audits through the Auditor General of the future—a new framework, a new approach for updates, a new annual report, a new portal, the use of AI. All of these things are very encouraging. Your opening remarks were, I guess, a very concise set of remarks. If I could go through that list, I'm going to give you an opportunity to expand on them.

For example, what does the new framework look like?

[Karen Hogan]

I think the new framework was linked to how we're going to follow up on the past recommendations, which I already elaborated on, but we are looking at our audit methodology. Very much along the lines of what I said to Public Services and Procurement Canada, we're saying, let's not add more procurement rules. Let's follow the rules we have, or take a step back and try to rationalize them.

We'd like to take a step back to see whether we just kept adding and now we're doing too much in some areas. Then, can we make our audit methodology and the framework that we follow more focused? If we free up a few hundred hours over a hundred financial audits, we're going to create some more capacity for us. Those would be two areas around the framework that we're looking at.

We're also looking at how we end up writing our reports. We find that report writing takes a long time. How can we get together sooner and start thinking about what the story might look like so that we can be more efficient through that process?

We're trying to do things internally to be more efficient and get to the endgame faster.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

I appreciate that.

In the new annual report, what can we expect that's different from the way you are reporting now? What will it look like for the general public and for parliamentarians who are assisted by your work? Give us an indication of what that is going to look like.

[Karen Hogan]

It's going to look a little different because it's going to be a different type of assurance. There's nothing that has come to our attention to make us believe that there hasn't been good progress. It's a slightly different level of assurance. It isn't going to be a full story about how we went in and relooked at the entire program. We went in to look at whether they acted on the commitments they made as a result of a recommendation.

I think it's going to be a little harder to wrap your mind around because you'll have to understand what was in the report and then know that we just looked at the recommendations to see the progress they were making.

The first report we're going to issue in 2026 will only look at five organizations over a course of three years. I forget how many there are. I think there are 70 recommendations. Then we're going to ask you for your feedback. At least for this committee, we're going to want some feedback on what it will look like before we grow it to 100% of all of our recommendations, on whether it is what you expected and on whether it is meeting your needs.

Then the online portal will just be a searchable database for all of those, so that you can look at an organization or a topic without needing to have me here to help you go through all of that.

We're hoping that will keep the pressure on departments to act.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

That is your time, Mr. Osborne. If you have a quick follow-up, go right ahead.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

It will take a little more time than that. Give me more time on my next set. How's that?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

You will be able to share with Ms. Yip, I think, if she's agreeable.

Mr. Lemire, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you.

Ms. Hogan, your report states that you removed the results indicator that indicates when considerable improvements have been made following your audits.

The numbers show your results are between 50% and 55%, so this is a fairly important point to analyze because such indicators show whether or not the government has improved its processes. We see that that only happens 50% of the time.

Why did you remove that indicator? Was it because it was shedding a lot of light on the government’s weaknesses when it comes to follow up?

[Karen Hogan]

Not at all. We removed it, but we replaced it with something else. We removed the indicator because it was based on a very small sample.

We are now going to implement a new audit. We are going to give you a new product. We intend to look at all the recommendations we have made after three years. As such, if an audit was done in 2022, we will wait for three years and then follow up on all recommendations, and not just a small sample.

We have removed this indicator and replaced it with something that is more comprehensive than the existing indicator. The results you mentioned, the 55%, made us decide to create a different product because we need to change our approach if recommendations are not implemented.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Of course, you often highlight the lack of follow-up.

I would like to take this opportunity to ask you whether your office needs more powers. We have spoken about money a lot, but do you need more authorities?

[Karen Hogan]

At this point, we would like to have clarification on our right to access information so that we are more effective in our audits.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Do you have access to all the documentation you need to do your work?

[Karen Hogan]

I would say we do, but sometimes the process takes time.

Sometimes it’s very easy, but as I said, we often get redacted information, or we are told that we can’t access classified information. That causes delay. We do end up working things out. If things had not been resolved to our satisfaction, we would tell you that now.

We need our right to access information to be clarified in legislation so that it is codified and clear to everyone. I believe that would make us more efficient.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Have you dealt with agencies that are particularly unresponsive?

[Karen Hogan]

As I said, some Crown corporations have said they would not share information with us because our right of access was not clear.

Some departments push back every year during our financial audits in the public accounts. It takes a lot of energy and time on my part and for many of our auditors to resolve the matter. I think that everyone across the public service would just like to give us the information more quickly, but our legislation needs to be clarified to ensure everyone feels comfortable.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I understand it would be important to enhance your capacity to oversight of Crown corporations.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Now we will go to Mr. Stevenson for five minutes, please.