Public Accounts Committee on May 4th, 2026

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I now call the meeting to order.

Welcome to meeting number 37 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Accounts.

Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format, pursuant to the Standing Orders. Members are attending in person in the room and remotely using the Zoom application.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(g), the committee will begin consideration of the spring 2026 reports of the Auditor General of Canada.

I would like to welcome our witnesses.

From the Office of the Auditor General, we have Karen Hogan, Auditor General of Canada. We also have Jerry DeMarco, commissioner of the environment and sustainable development, along with Markirit Armutlu, principal, Milan Duvnjak, Susie Fortier and Marie-Pierre Grondin, director.

It's nice to see all of you.

Ms. Hogan, you and your team will have the five or so minutes you require. We'll give you the time you feel you need to present your reports today.

Thank you.

[Karen Hogan, Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General]

Good morning, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before the committee today to discuss our reports that were just tabled.

I want to start by acknowledging that we are gathered on the traditional, unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.

With me today is Jerry DeMarco, the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development, who will speak to three of the audit reports that my office presented to Parliament this morning. We are also accompanied by the principals who were responsible for the audits. In addition to our performance audit reports and as is our usual practice, we have also provided Parliament with copies of our special examinations of the National Capital Commission and of the International Development Research Centre, which were made public since our last tabling.

I will begin with our audit of initiatives that have been described by the Government of Canada as the new fiscal relationship with first nations. The government committed to co-developing initiatives with first nations partners, including increasing the predictability and flexibility of federal funding, to support reconciliation and the gradual transfer of services to first nations.

Overall, we found that Indigenous Services Canada did not effectively implement, monitor or assess the initiatives it committed to. While the department introduced 10-year grants, and while payments were aligned with funding agreements, it did not consistently monitor whether grant recipients remained eligible for funding. More than $6.5 billion in grants has been distributed, but the department did not know whether grants were achieving intended outcomes, including reducing socio-economic gaps between first nations and other Canadians.

Important initiatives to truly transform the fiscal relationship between first nations and the federal government remain largely undeveloped. For example, Indigenous Services Canada did not implement a framework to establish mutual accountability between first nations and their citizens, and between first nations and the department.

Also, the department did not meet its key commitment to support the development of first nations financial management capacity to avoid financial default.

The new fiscal relationship initiatives are an important part of Indigenous Services Canada’s mandate to gradually transfer services to first nations. The department needs to improve how it implements and delivers these initiatives to meet its commitments to help improve socio-economic outcomes and advance reconciliation.

I will now turn to our audit of accessibility in seven federal organizations.

Overall, we found that all had fostered accessible workplaces for employees with disabilities, with key areas for improvement remaining.

All organizations we examined had made progress in the representation of persons with disabilities in their workforces. We found that promotion rates across employee groups were comparable and that all seven organizations had accessibility practices in place, such as executive champions and networks for persons with disabilities.

While I am encouraged by the progress to date in representation and the commitment to accessibility, there is still room for improvement in how accommodations are delivered and employees with disabilities are engaged. For example, we found that employee networks were not consistently consulted on the implementation of decisions affecting them.

In addition, while all organizations had measures in place to address workplace barriers, processes to deliver accommodations need to be improved. The time required to respond to employees' accommodation requests ranged from an average of 24 to 310 days. Inconsistent data collection limited the ability of organizations to identify recurring issues and systemic barriers.

Federal organizations have a duty to ensure that all employees can participate fully and equally in the workplace. Building on the progress made to date requires ongoing focus on accessibility and efficient processes.

I will now turn it over to the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development to summarize the next three reports.

[Jerry V. DeMarco, Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, Office of the Auditor General]

Thank you.

The reports I am presenting today focus on the federal government’s efforts to address global challenges posed by climate change and avian influenza. To better protect Canadians now and in the future, stronger action is needed to adapt to our rapidly changing world.

Our first audit focused on flood hazard mapping, which is becoming increasingly important as Canada’s climate changes. We can no longer rely only on present-day data to prepare for floods. We also need to plan for future climate scenarios, including changing precipitation patterns. This is especially timely, given the significant flooding seen in many regions of Canada this spring. Flood hazard maps are a tool to inform residents, developers and infrastructure planners of the risks of flooding in a given area.

We found that Natural Resources Canada, Environment and Climate Change Canada, and Public Safety Canada were slow to produce and share the flood hazard maps needed to protect communities and support climate change adaptation.

Natural Resources Canada did not ensure that mapping efforts prioritized higher-risk areas. Many maps remain incomplete, and much of the existing mapping information is not practical or usable. The department is also not on track to make all maps currently in production publicly available by the target year of 2028.

We also found that Public Safety Canada's planned flood risk awareness portal did not integrate climate change considerations or allow information to be easily updated as conditions change. This means that information in the portal will not reflect changes to flood risks over time.

Climate change projections and easily available flood maps are needed to reliably inform long-term planning decisions, such as where to build homes or develop infrastructure. Canadians face escalating risks and higher disaster recovery costs in the absence of up-to-date information.

In our next audit, we found significant gaps in the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat’s oversight of the greening government strategy to strengthen the climate resilience of federal services and federal assets, which are valued at about $100 billion.

We found that the framework to track progress was weak. Also, despite repeated commitments, the secretariat did not publicly report on climate resilience in the eight years that followed the strategy’s launch in 2017. These gaps hindered decision-making and accountability.

At the organizational level, the audit examined how National Defence, Public Services and Procurement Canada, and Fisheries and Oceans Canada assessed climate risks and acted to enhance the climate resilience of their assets, services and activities. Together, these three departments manage more than two-thirds of the federal government’s physical assets, such as buildings and bridges. We found that they had made limited progress in translating risk assessments into meaningful action.

This lack of progress has clear environmental and financial consequences for Canadians. As Canada warms at twice the global average, accelerating efforts to protect federal assets and services will sustain communities and save taxpayers money over time. For example, small harbours, which directly support more than 45,000 jobs, are vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and require immediate repairs and reinforcement.

Our final audit assessed the federal response to avian influenza. An outbreak of the disease began in Canada in 2021, and there were concerns the virus could mutate and become more easily transmissible. While Environment and Climate Change Canada, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the Public Health Agency of Canada took action to prevent and manage outbreaks of avian influenza, we found that they need to improve on planning and documentation, and the management of human vaccines, to better prepare for future threats to public health and vulnerable wildlife.

For example, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency successfully implemented procedures to eliminate the virus from all 47 premises in our audit sample. There were, however, some weaknesses in the agency's documentation of its activities.

We also found that Environment and Climate Change Canada redirected funding to expand its surveillance of migratory birds following the 2021 outbreak, but without dedicated funding, this activity may not be sustainable. In addition, the department did not target surveillance on the virus's impact on at-risk species that are or could become threatened, endangered, or extinct.

Finally, with respect to preparedness, we found that the Public Health Agency of Canada secured vaccines for people at higher risk of exposure, such as farmers and veterinarians, but purchasing decisions were not supported by sufficient analysis. This led to an oversupply. More than 95% of the purchased vaccine doses expired before they could be used.

I will now turn it back to the Auditor General.

Thank you.

[Karen Hogan]

Thank you.

Across these audits, a consistent pattern emerges. Programs are in place, funding is being delivered and risks are known, but weaknesses in implementation and monitoring affect the achievement of results. This is not a new pattern. I raised similar concerns at the midpoint of my mandate last year about long-standing issues in how federal programs are designed, delivered and measured, including in areas affecting first nations.

Our audit of the new fiscal initiatives shows that when a department does not act on its commitments intended to address long-standing issues, it falls short on delivering critical outcomes, such as advancing reconciliation.

Our audit of avian influenza also highlights similar issues in a different context. I am concerned that despite experience from past public health events, including COVID-19, gaps in planning, data and decision-making have not been addressed and continue to affect preparedness.

This concludes our opening remarks. We would be pleased to answer any questions the committee may have. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much to you both.

We'll now begin our first round, which will consist of three members having six minutes each.

Ms. Kusie, lead us off, please, for six minutes.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much, Auditor General, for being here today with your team.

You've expressed, in your opening statement, the exact frustration my Conservative colleagues and I are feeling here today. As well, Canadians should be feeling it here today in terms of consistent problems that are not being fixed.

I'm going to focus today on accessibility in the public service.

The summary includes statements such as: There are ineffective “processes to handle the volume of requests”; they "did not consistently collect data about the requests”; and not all “organizations” tracked “resolution times”.

On page 14 of this report, it mentions:

Missing date information. At the Public Service Commission of Canada, 90 records did not include the date when accommodation requests...were submitted or when they were addressed.

There was an:

Inconsistent approach to record a request closure. At the Canada Revenue Agency, dates recorded as closed sometimes included monitoring periods after the accommodation was provided. We found that this made the closing date an imprecise indicator of accommodation request resolution.

Missing type of accommodation. At Employment and Social Development Canada, 14% of the records were missing the information describing the measure implemented. This limited the analysis of requests by type of solution implemented.

On page 16, exhibit 4 states:

The organizations that had informal goals or tracked timeliness to address accommodation requests had faster resolutions

No kidding.

Auditor General, I'm going to go back to your GC Strategies report, which was issued almost exactly a year ago today plus a month. It was June 10, 2025. In a committee meeting, you said, “The findings of this audit echo those of previous audits that also showed deficiencies”.

A year later, you are saying that you are finding deficiencies. We are referring to a report from a year ago that said there was a pattern of deficiencies here specifically in GC Strategies and how public servants applied federal procurement rules.

You have said, time and time again, that the government need only follow and apply the rules, or in this case, the processes. Again, the public service seems incapable of doing so under the leadership of the government.

When will this government learn from your reports and apply the recommendations of the reports throughout the public service? It's beyond frustrating at this point, since we seem to repeat the same process of you coming here indicating your frustration and disappointment in the actions of the public service under this government to carry out what should be simple processes, rules and regulations. Can you respond to that, please?

[Karen Hogan]

You raise many examples, and I'm not sure which ones to pick to answer. I guess what I would focus in—

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

There are so many, unfortunately.

My apologies for interrupting.

[Karen Hogan]

—on is that there are two different situations here. In responding to a health crisis, the government, over many years, has lived through different crises, whether it is H1N1,SARS or the COVID-19 pandemic. We saw that we were repeating recommendations to resolve issues of data- and information-sharing among the provinces, territories and the federal government to be better prepared, to take the time to invest in preparedness and to use fulsome data to make decisions. We saw some of those same concerns being repeated when we looked at avian flu.

It's very different when you look at accessibility in the public service, however. This is a journey that began once the accessibility act was in law in 2019. We saw some progress, but issues that you raised there, however, are about accommodation.

Many departments have not put a formalized structure around duty-to-accommodate requests. That's why we're seeing very varying outcomes there.

This is something as basic as removing a barrier to ensure that a public servant can participate fully and equally in the workplace. Waiting almost 300 days is way too long. I would expect that every department and agency will look at this report on accessibility, look at themselves and see if they need to make progress.

I can tell all of the committee members here that I put my own office through the same questions. We have areas that we can improve in, very much like the departments we audited. In some cases, we're doing better, but I think it's about every deputy head focusing in on what they can improve within their organization when it comes to accessibility.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

On a similar note, page 18 of the report states, “A critical factor influencing these disparate experiences was identified as the individual's direct supervisor and immediate line of management.” This is seen consistently across satisfaction in jobs, this primary factor, but as well, it was reported that there is “a lack of meaningful engagement” outside of required touchpoints in terms of the evaluation of this program across departments.

What this really speaks of to me is leadership: having compassion and care for these individuals, for this community. In both of these quotes that I've just given, there seems to be a lack of this. What does this say about the leadership of this government relative to these accommodations of this community?

[Karen Hogan]

I would like to clarify that accessibility is not a program. Every employer has a responsibility, a duty, especially in the public service, to ensure all employees can participate fully and equally in the workplace.

You're absolutely right that a supervisor has the biggest impact on an individual in a workplace; the person you report to every single day. What we found is that there were varying degrees of awareness across supervisors about accessibility concerns, especially if a disability was an invisible disability. We saw that departments didn't consistently require training in this area. That's just a first place to start.

More importantly, the government had put in place an accessibility passport, which was supposed to be a tool that employees could use to support a dialogue with their supervisor. However, there is very inconsistent application or use of the passport and a lack of awareness among many supervisors. That passport is supposed to help a person as they might move around the public service to not have to keep repeating what that they need, so that every employer and supervisor knows how to support them better.

I think the public service is at the beginning of this journey, but it is time now to invest some time and energy into making sure that the experience of every employee, whether they identify as having a disability or not, is equal and level, and that they can fully participate.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much. That is your time.

Next is Ms. Tesser Derksen, please, for six minutes.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to the whole team for being here today to once again answer our questions. It's now my third time participating in the release of new reports, and I feel like I'm starting to get the hang of it a bit, so bear with me while I go through some questions.

I want to address my colleague Ms. Kusie's comments about recurring themes, which I've also noticed. Certainly, it's frustrating as elected people when we see the intention of policies at a high level not necessarily filtering down and impacting people the way they're meant to. It really speaks to, I think, the rubber hitting the road, and the impact and the implementation not quite reaching the goals that we always intend for them.

That being said, I want to be fair in noting that there are improvements made in different areas over time and that we're constantly working to better ourselves. The work you do, Ms. Hogan, at your office with your team, is so critical to making sure that those departments are held accountable and making sure that they're constantly improving.

I want to reference first the “New Fiscal Initiatives With First Nations” report, specifically with respect to the default prevention and management policy. Your report noted that the first two levels of what I would call “accountability oversight” had been removed. Do we know why those have been removed?

[Karen Hogan]

Those were removed so there would be more flexibility and control by first nations in how they might navigate certain financial difficulties. The last level was left in place as an interim measure, where they would bring in a third party to help manage if there were a significant financial default. It was really to give the responsibility and the power back to first nations communities.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Okay. When you say that it's giving responsibility and power back to first nations communities, I would interpret that as the overarching goal of self-governance of first nations communities and an important step in that way. Would it be fair to say that those levels that had been removed were contravening the principle of self-determination? Was that the impression you had?

[Karen Hogan]

I think that would be a question to ask, why it was repealed, but the default prevention and management policy was then supposed to be replaced.

I think what it was supposed to be replaced with is even more important. It was meant to create and bolster capacity in first nations communities. While they removed what many first nations communities might not have appreciated about the policy, they haven't taken the step that will really make a difference, which is making sure that capacity to avoid financial management issues, or default, is bolstered in communities. That's one of the commitments that is largely undeveloped right now.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

Okay. Thank you for that.

I want to talk a little bit as well about the mutual accountability framework. One of your findings had said that in regard to replacing the First Nations Financial Transparency Act with a mutual accountability framework, you found that ISC had not created the framework, basically.

I think in your report you also referenced that some first nations were not necessarily satisfied with the draft, and that it didn't quite engage first nations to the extent that it should; it wasn't adequate in engaging them in them being the drivers of those outcomes.

Can you comment a little bit about that and how you see the delay in what appears to be maybe a breakdown in the negotiations and how that's affecting the implementation of improvements?

[Karen Hogan]

This is an area where we actually saw some collaboration with first nations partners and the department. They were co-creating what a mutual accountability framework would look like.

I would give you a visual that looks like a triangle. You would have first nations being accountable to their own citizens, but then also having first nations and the government being accountable to each other, so a nation-to-nation type of accountability.

The first step was to create a way to measure what that would look like, so how you would measure if socio-economic gaps had closed. There was a lot of dialogue and discussion, but then the department went away and came up with measures. I think that's where the first nations said that they wanted to help define how to measure what closing a socio-economic gap might look like, and that it shouldn't be a one-size-fits-all type of solution.

It was a step in the right direction but then a step back to the usual way of doing things. I think that's why we saw it being paused and stalled.

[Kristina Tesser Derksen, Liberal, Milton East—Halton Hills South, ON]

It's very valuable insight.

I want to turn to Mr. DeMarco and your flood hazard mapping report.

When I was a municipal councillor, I sat on the board of our local conservation authority, and we engaged quite a bit with flood plain mapping. Very dense parts of our community exist within flood plains, so we always had questions from developers and people wanting to make changes to properties.

We engaged with some lidar technology to establish new mapping and ended up expanding the flood plain to a significant extent.

In your report, in the overall message portion, you note that Public Safety Canada has a portal to help identify flood risks, but that the portal does not consider climate change projections, which is surprising. Your report notes that the risk ratings are based on “present-day assumptions” related to flooding. Would you mind indulging me in explaining what you mean by present-day assumptions?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

Canada's climate is changing, and it's changing more rapidly than the global average. Historically, we could plan for floods by looking back and looking at history and records. We used to say there's a 100-year flood line, and that was based on history.

But with our climate changing, we need to, as best as possible, create scenarios about what the future may look like and plan for that, instead of just looking back. The fact that the portal is being produced, and that we are trying to democratize this information and make it accessible to Canadians, is good, but if it doesn't have the capability of being updated easily, and it doesn't have the capability for users to select climate-change scenarios in the mapping, then its utility is limited. It is more like what we've been doing in the past, in terms of looking back to plan for the future. There's nothing wrong with that in a relatively stable climate, but with a changing climate we need to factor in as much as possible, recognizing that there is a degree of uncertainty in future rainfall patterns and future flooding along rivers and lakes.

I would have expected that the portal, being an initiative undertaken at a time when Canada recognizes the need to adapt to climate, would have that capability.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

I'm afraid that is the time, Ms. Tesser Derksen.

Mr. Bonin, you have six minutes.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Auditor General, commissioner.

A year ago, the Bloc Québécois conducted a study to quantify, among other things, the costs of climate change for individuals and governments. In our view, it is very clear that, regardless of what happens on the international stage, even if we ignore climate change, its impacts will not go away.

Commissioner, you note in your report today that the costs of the impacts of climate change are rising, particularly with regard to flooding, that adaptation costs are likely to increase, and that the government has once again, in many respects, made commitments without achieving the expected results in terms of adaptation and resilience.

You produced a report last year on the adaptation strategy. Based on your analysis, I understand that the government, through its lack of seriousness regarding the fight against climate change, crises and their impacts, is increasing the bill that will be passed on to Canadians in the coming years. And that's not even counting the repercussions. There will be human tragedies, among other things.

In short, what the government isn't doing—or isn't doing well enough—right now will come at a cost. Is that your assessment of the situation?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

It is true that investing now will lower the cost of adapting to climate change for future generations.

The national adaptation strategy, which was the subject of an audit we published a year ago, states that every dollar spent on adaptation and resilience measures can generate savings of $13 to $15. This is only an estimate, but it gives an idea of what we can do now not only to adapt, but to save money for future taxpayers.

If we act immediately and more quickly, we will be more resilient and ensure better value for money for Canadian taxpayers.

[Patrick Bonin, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

What do you think about the fact that, in the 2026-27 budget, Environment and Climate Change Canada is cutting spending on climate change adaptation by nearly $530 million compared to 2024-25? These are essentially cuts; only $37 million remains for adaptation.

You say it will cost more if we don't invest today. So, does it concern you that the government is investing $530 million less in climate change adaptation?

[Jerry V. DeMarco]

In last year's report, one of our findings was that it was difficult to arrive at an overall figure for adaptation measures, so I can't comment specifically on the figure you just provided.

However, we need sufficient resources to adapt. If we act now, it will be less costly in the future.

Furthermore, we need a system to determine whether the measures are yielding good results. According to today's report, there is a lot of analysis, but not many results regarding the resilience of federal assets.