Public Accounts committee  We didn't identify an issue like that, where taxis were being reimbursed, but we did not do a detailed audit of the $342 million.

Public Accounts committee  You're correct that this was our second audit. The first audit covered March to June of 2020. Where we did note some improvements from the Public Health Agency was in its ability to contact travellers to determine whether or not they were quarantining. In the first audit, we found that they were unable to follow up with 66% of travellers.

Public Accounts committee  Obviously we didn't focus on rural Canadians. What we did was look at whether or not the Public Health Agency had worked through that sort of cohesive enforcement regime. As we've been saying this morning, that wasn't thought through when the measures were put in place. Having clear guidance that's well understood comes with good monitoring and a good enforcement regime to ensure that it's being followed.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. In this case, we did not look at the IT system and whether it was operating effectively, and we did not look at the complaint resolution. We were looking to determine whether or not the agency could explain to us whether these border measures were effective at limiting the spread.

Public Accounts committee  We currently don't have any plans to look at other border measures. That is considering where we are in the pandemic. That can obviously change as we move forward. We monitor the environment and make decisions based on that. When it comes to speaking with Canadians directly, we found in other audits that there's sometimes a hesitancy to want to speak to us, especially when it's a very personal matter.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you. I believe that in the cases you're talking about, law enforcement was the right party to do that investigation, not our office. I'm happy they followed through on that. I will take your feedback under advisement as we consider whether or not we want to do another audit on the border and as we continue to improve our auditing through a GBA+ lens.

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, I'll go first and then I'll leave some time for Dr. Kochhar. The purpose of the ticketing regime was really to see national enforcement of quarantine measures across the country, and it was clear from our findings that the Public Health Agency hadn't worked through the cohesive enforcement requirement across the country.

Public Accounts committee  First of all, I am pleased to report that we have reached an agreement and all employees are back in the office as of yesterday. We will now enter a period of healing and I am very much looking forward to a new normal that will allow us to better support the work of Parliament.

Public Accounts committee  Are you talking about individuals who tested positive?

Public Accounts committee  I would ask Ms. McCalla to answer this question. However, I know that just over 1,000 people who tested positive were not contacted. Ms. McCalla, could you give us the exact percentage of people who were contacted?

Public Accounts committee  I will ask Ms. McCalla to add to this with a little more detail. Part of our work included looking at the security measures that the Public Health Agency had in place to monitor the quarantine facility and the government-authorized hotels. During the scope of our audit, we were aware of one issue that had been investigated in rather detailed fashion, I believe, by the agency, and measures were being taken to address it.

Public Accounts committee  During our analysis, when we looked at what the Public Health Agency had done for gender-based analysis plus, we saw they had collected information but really not used that information or analyzed it to see whether or not adjustments needed to be made. One of the other recommendations we saw that came out of their own analysis and hadn't been implemented was the bias training for many officials.

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, thank you for this opportunity to discuss our report on the enforcement of quarantine and COVID-19 testing orders by the Public Health Agency of Canada, which was tabled in the House of Commons on December 9, 2021. I would like to acknowledge that this hearing is taking place on the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.

Public Accounts committee  I agree with you that the government as a whole, the Prime Minister himself, acknowledged that systemic racism exists in the federal public service and it exists in Canada. The issues that we saw were ones that were systemic problems across the organization that allowed our findings to happen.

Public Accounts committee  No, there is not.