Evidence of meeting #6 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 41st Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was audit.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Okay.
In 2012 you audited the aviation side of regulatory oversight. If I recall correctly, that was chapter five of the report.
Is Transport Canada doing better on the aviation oversight side than they are on the rail side? And what would be one or two major differences?
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Again you're correct. We did the previous audit of aviation oversight. We didn't do a line-by-line comparison of the two. I think we found some similar issues in that it was taking a long time to deal with specific issues. We found similar issues, but whether one is better or worse than the other, we haven't really made that assessment.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
On page 24, under inspections, it says:
If the department took these changes into account and relied more on the results of its audit work, it might have to conduct fewer inspections. It could conduct more audits using resources now devoted to inspections.
We have one side saying we need to do more inspections.
Are you saying in your report that we need to do more inspections or more audits?
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
What we're saying is that Transport Canada needs to determine what it needs to do to get the needed level of assurance that the safety management systems are working. Based on what they have put in place, which is to focus more on audits...again, with audits, they test a system—
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
With due respect, Mr. Ferguson, it doesn't say that Transport Canada suggested it could conduct fewer inspections—or at least that's not what the language concludes.
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
I'm getting to that.
Conservative
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
When you do an audit, you are auditing a system. When you audit a system to determine whether the system functions or not, then you can do fewer individual tests of the system, which is what inspections do.
Conservative
Auditor General of Canada, Office of the Auditor General of Canada
Therefore, it may be possible that if you can do fewer inspections, that will help fund doing the audits. I think that's what we're pointing out.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
Okay, very good.
I'd like to thank Mr. Ferguson, Mr. Laplante, Mr. Chouinard, for being here.
Thank you very much.
Mr. Watson didn't want his last five minutes, so—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
You can ask him, but I'm guessing he's not going to give it to you.
Mr. Watson, I'll let you speak for yourself.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
No, Chair.
The way the routine rules of the committee are established, it's based on equity of questioning. We're finished with questions.
Thank you.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
Thank you.
Once again, thanks to our witnesses.
The meeting is adjourned.
