Public Accounts committee  Sure. This one might need more than 15 seconds, but I won't take more than a minute and a half. It's not new. It's an evolving challenge. It's one that we've spent a lot of time thinking about. What I was going to say was that, if you read the Auditor General's report, one thing that I think we all agree on is that it is a challenging area to reach those who are hard to reach.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for this opportunity to discuss the Canada Revenue Agency’s response to the Auditor General of Canada’s Report 1— Access to Benefits for Hard-to-Reach Populations. Today, I am accompanied by two agency assistant commissioners, namely Gillian Pranke and Maxime Guénette.

Public Accounts committee  Madam Chair, I'm sorry, but I don't have those numbers right now. We can provide them to you after the meeting, unless my colleague Mr. Gallivan has them with him. In any case, we'll find that information. We'll have to make sure it's not confidential first, but I don't think it is.

Public Accounts committee  I'll say a few words, and then I'm sure my colleague Michael will have a few things to say. Obviously, one of the things the pandemic has made us all realize is the importance of digitization for now and for the future. I say that knowing that the agency actually had made a lot of progress before the pandemic.

Public Accounts committee  I thank the hon. member for his question. The agency's reputation is important to us, both in times of pandemic and in normal times. It's important because for the tax system to work, Canadians need to have confidence in the agency. So, the agency's reputation is a factor in the decision to participate in the tax system, among other things.

Public Accounts committee  These are two aspects of the agency's reputation. First, it is its ability to deliver benefits in a timely and efficient manner. Second, it is its ability to ensure that those who receive benefits are eligible for them. It's important for us to preserve both aspects of the agency's reputation.

Public Accounts committee  It is certainly always possible to criticize the agency, but I'm very pleased with the balance that we've been able to achieve in this context, as we did audits early in the program. Mr. Gallivan described actions that the agency took during that period, including using information obtained by our auditors.

Public Accounts committee  We really had to find a balance, and that was it. Should we do more manual reviews and slow down the process, or have no process and make sure the money goes out in a timely manner? We used the information we had at the time to determine that balance. Mr. Gallivan may be able to provide more information.

Public Accounts committee  Madam Chair, I could probably go on for a couple of hours about that experience, but I will just hit a couple of the highlights and pick up on what Andrew said. Obviously it was a time of imperfect information, and for us there was a confluence of events. It was tax-filing season, as you've indicated.

Public Accounts committee  Certainly, and I might just add in Max to put some fine details on the communications plan. That issue is important to us: Whatever the benefit is, is it going to be taxed, or not? We face that question on an ongoing basis. It was important in this context. We actually feel that it was clear for us once the program started.

Public Accounts committee  Madam Chair, I think that relates to a conversation that we had earlier on how sensitive we need to be about those kinds of compliance and collection issues. One thing that is true from the agency's perspective is that these kinds of programs have a longer tail to them. Some people think, “Well, the program's over, so our work is done”, but we have to think about how we are going to ensure compliance and collection in the longer term.

Public Accounts committee  Yes, and I'll leave a bit of space if Mr. Gallivan wants to add. That program is an ongoing program that looks at delinquent filers to understand why they didn't file and tries to work with them to get them to file. It has had a fairly sizable return, so we have no thought of discontinuing that program.

Public Accounts committee  I'll go right to Ted for that answer.

Public Accounts committee  Madam Chair, I think it would be inappropriate in this forum to talk about specific taxpayer issues, and there are lots of different circumstances and situations out there. What I was referring to is that overall we do need to look at it case by case to determine what we think is fair and reasonable and where there is more of a systemic issue, and I talked about the gross versus net that we saw on the CERB.

Public Accounts committee  I already referenced, Madam Chair, the gross versus net issue, on which the government did take action to basically allow access to people whose gross income was greater than $5,000, but not their net income. That was kind of a systemic issue. If you go down into individual cases, we really have to look at the facts of those situations and try to take an appropriate compliance position or collection position.