Mr. Speaker, our government treats taxpayer money with the utmost respect. Professional services are needed to acquire special expertise and to meet unexpected fluctuations in workload. In come cases, the government contracts private sector companies to deliver or improve services, without maintaining an expensive government bureaucracy. Professional service contracting means that the government is only paying people when there is work to be done.
Professional service costs are down $200 million since 2010-11. Temporary help services are down $11 million since last year and by $75 million since 2010-11.