Jane Stewart

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, let us be straight with the Canadian public. Let us be straight with the facts, that on this side of the House we take administration very seriously.

We are going to have an administration of grants and contributions that will be second to none. As well as being straight with the Canadian public, on this side of the House we believe that the Government of Canada has a role to play in ensuring that those in need, Canadians with disabilities, young people who cannot get jobs and communities that have not been able to engage in our great economy, get the help they need because that is the right thing to do.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, what Deloitte & Touche suggested was that we needed to have greater cohesiveness in our program in order to orchestrate the various actions of the program.

What did we do? We actually put together a grants and contributions team, a team focused on this. They asked us to make an assurance that the funds being transferred were transferred in accordance with program requirements. We made sure that senior executives were making the final sign-off on those transfer terms.

What did they say we should do? They said that we should make sure we address the root causes of the audit findings. We are doing a number of things in that regard, making sure employees have training and we are—

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

On the contrary, Mr. Speaker. I feel very comfortable in this particular file. We have reviewed it. We have identified that we have invoices. That is confirmed and are appropriate under the terms and conditions of the program.

I feel very comfortable in our six point plan and the work of my department to build a modern system of comptrollership that will respond to the taxpayer in an appropriate way.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, with requesters responding to access requests, as I have made clear to the House, my department has been deluged by those requests. We have more this year than we had in the whole of last year. We have issued 115,000 pages of information, and we will respond to that particular request.

Again I say that when we are talking about information on companies here in the country or on individuals in the country, the responsible and appropriate way to make that information public is through the access to information process. As the member knows, I have no decision making authority in what information is conveyed. What can be conveyed will be conveyed.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is talking about a particular access to information request. If he would like to bring that forward we will look at it more, but I can tell him that there has been no information on this particular file that has gone out through access to information yesterday or the day before.

Let us be clear about access to information. This is an act of this House, as is the Privacy Act. I make no decisions on the information that is conveyed to requesters. The hon. member knows that. I would suggest to him that it is and does remain the responsible way to provide information on private paperwork of citizens in this country, using the acts that have been passed by the House.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member makes reference to mistakes. I would like to clarify something from yesterday.

Yesterday this member said that he had received on Monday documentation on this company from the ATIP section of my department. I would like to clarify that my officials have advised me that in fact no such documentation was issued yesterday, the day before that, the week before that, or even the month before that. Was that a mistake?

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I presented to the standing committee the six point plan back in February. I suggested to all members if they had advice to give us to strengthen that plan that they do so.

I have not had one recommendation from that party to strengthen the plan because it is amended and it is working. We are making and taking corrective action in my department.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Very slowly, as my colleague suggests. We put together a plan. What we felt was appropriate to do was to test this plan with outside experts, the auditor general, Deloitte & Touche, and the advisory committee to treasury board. They all gave us recommendations and we implemented those recommendations to tighten our plan.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, let me try again.

[Human Resources Development, May 3rd, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, quite the opposite. In fact, Deloitte & Touche said that we had a good short term plan and Deloitte & Touche gave us recommendations on how to make it better for the longer term.

We implemented those plans. We have added aspects of training and we have added aspects focusing on accountability. We have ensured that senior management know what their roles are and what accountable role they will have to play.

We have a plan that will work. Men and women across the country are implementing this plan day and night because they believe in providing good service to the taxpayer. We will do it.