Evidence of meeting #47 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was projects.
A video is available from Parliament.
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll be splitting my time with Mr. Fraser.
You follow the money. That's how you titled the report. But in my old days, in a transit project, we would look at other factors: the social factors, environmental factors, the quality of life, and how the project synchronized with the rest of the system. Sometimes measuring only how useful the dollars have been and what results they've generated doesn't really tell the whole story. It occurs to me that one of two things would have to happen. Either your mandate could be expanded to look at those non-monetary issues or we need another body like you to do that.
Do you have any thoughts on that?
I'm sorry, that was....
12:40 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
12:40 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
It's a good question. You're raising the analysis that we do with our multiplier, because that's what we do implicitly with this.
Looking at all the other impacts is more difficult; it's often done after the fact or after the project is completed.
I don't know. Somewhere in the other place, again, we raised the issue about GBA analysis of these infrastructure projects, which is very difficult. So maybe in another life or something like that....
I don't know if Mostafa wants to add something.
12:45 p.m.
Assistant Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
As you mentioned, it's our mandate. We are a budget office. So we follow the money to the extent that it has economic and fiscal implications, and that's really where we are at. We don't follow money like the Auditor General in terms of whether money has been properly spent or not, but our main objective is to look at the economic and fiscal implications of government programs. That's our mandate. If our mandate is changed by Parliament to include other things, then we would certainly have to provide that information as well.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you for that.
I'll turn my time over now to Mr. Fraser.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
On the reporting or accounting practices, are there great variances between the different provinces or municipalities from project to project right now?
12:45 p.m.
Assistant Parliamentary Budget Officer, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
Not that we know of, no. We don't really know exactly how it goes.
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
Do you mean in terms of reporting the money that they receive from the federal government?
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Either reporting or in terms of the time at which the money is received....
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
It is known that some provinces, as I mentioned before—and certainly in the case of Quebec—tend to wait until the end of their fiscal year. That pattern has been seen previously with other projects.
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
For other provinces, they probably have the same kinds of practices. The Auditor General looked at this in the past and found some kind of a pattern that can be explained. There's a lot of seasonality in these infrastructure projects, as you know. You're coming from municipalities, and you know how it can take time. That's why I used the words “dépenses vertigineuses” before. Eventually the summer comes, the spring comes, and all of a sudden you have a lot of money being reported by provinces.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Would it be helpful if there were some kind of effort to harmonize different practices, or maybe to say that we're going to go universally to a milestone-based or receipt-based payment time, so we don't end up with the perception that in Quebec, they may not be getting their fair share when that may or may not be the case?
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
I suspect that Infrastructure Canada and the federal government do not necessarily want to impose some kind of accounting practice on a province. I think that's what the DM of Infrastructure Canada said in response to this committee a couple of weeks ago when he said that every other week he is in contact with provinces to have some reports back. I don't know exactly the mechanism he's using, but he certainly mentioned that on the record.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
So, without imposing that kind of a condition on a project partner, is it going to be difficult to have certainty in the information at any given point in time?
Okay, I'll take your thought as a maybe.
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
Following the money until the end of a project may be difficult.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Sure.
Just in terms of increasing the maximum public accountability to Canadians, is there a certain kind of payment scheme, whether it is milestone-based or receipt-based, that makes it easier for the parliamentary budget officer to communicate to the public what's going on with the federal money?
12:45 p.m.
Senior Director, Costing and Program Analysis, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
A receipt-based approach is not terribly useful from our point of view. It's not a question I've been asked, and it's a very good one. A milestone basis might make some sense, because then we would anticipate a certain amount of work being done by that point.
Of course, then, we require standard measures and milestones right across the system, and that's a different discussion.
12:45 p.m.
Liberal
Sean Fraser Liberal Central Nova, NS
Sure, but that would help you highlight more clearly for Canadians, say, how many jobs have been created, on how many projects, at any given point in time. Is that fair?
12:45 p.m.
Senior Director, Costing and Program Analysis, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
Given the short time I've been thinking about it, for the last 10 seconds, I'd say sure, probably any information right now is better than no information.
12:45 p.m.
Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
May I turn to Jason, quickly? He's the accountant at the table.
12:45 p.m.
Director, Economic and Fiscal Analysis, Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, Library of Parliament
I think the only other point that I would raise is just by way of context. There are 15 of us, and there are close to 260,000 people who work for the federal public service of Canada. In terms of the information that you're looking for and you're suggesting should be collected on a standardized basis, one would imagine that the federal public service is actually collecting that information—or at least part of it—to present to the cabinet members, so they're in a good position to opine upon phase two and ensure that it's constructed effectively.
