Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak to the motion of the hon. member. He seeks to make it mandatory that the minister provide the reports.
I submit that the answer is clearly there. In conjunction with the budget speech normally delivered in February each year, the President of the Treasury Board tables on behalf of the Department of Natural Resources part III of the estimates which reports on the operations of the preceding fiscal year and the current fiscal year and as well includes proposals for the upcoming fiscal year. Therefore the intent of this amendment is already being met by those provisions. However, flexibility is needed as to when the report is delivered to Parliament so as to conform to the budget process.
We may ask why the obligation to table an annual report is not contained in this bill. Section 153 of the Financial Administration Act was amended on May 1, 1991 to permit statutory reports to be discontinued by order in council when they contained the same or less information as the estimates frompublic accounts. This provides a streamlined reporting to Parliament while ensuring no less information.
The cost savings as a result of this continuation of 23 statutory reports is estimated to be in the neighbourhood of $500,000 annually. Is the tabling of an annual state of forests no longer obligatory? The obligation to table this report in Parliament has been removed. This does not preclude the minister from tabling a report in Parliament. In addition the report could be required by regulation of the governor in council. The clause as written provides greater flexibility for parliamentarians to request changes to reports and timing of these reports.
The CFS has indicated that it may be more useful to see and measure progress on forest management and other forest related issues if such reports are every two or three years. If circumstances require, shorter time frames for reporting to Parliament on specific aspects of natural resources could be identified.
Changing a regulation is less cumbersome and consuming than changing the act.