Mr. Speaker, I would like to quote the past PBO on the use of the estimates for a slush fund. Kevin Page said, “There’s no way it’s an improvement.” He likes to cherry pick a couple of comments from the past PBO, but this is what he actually said of the vote 40 slush fund, that there was no way it was an improvement. He continues, “The irony is they’re asking Parliament to write a cheque, to provide these authorities, when the executive has not scrutinized the measures.”
The current PBO, whom the Treasury Board president seems to think is in agreement with him, said that because not one penny of the slush fund was in the departmental plans, the Treasury Board president had not aligned the estimates and the budget.
Seeing that the whole point of this was to align the estimates with the budget, which the PBO has said is clearly not done, could the President of the Treasury Board tell us why he is taking away the scrutiny and the power of Parliament when he has not accomplished what he tried to set out to do?