Public Accounts committee  What is important is finding out what the legislation allows. The code does not change or amend the legislation.

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, I am quite aware of the timelines that you have mentioned. However, changes have been made to the organizational structure that must also be taken into account. The Canada Public Service Agency was responsible for developing the code. And yet, the agency was abolished and its functions were integrated into Canada's Treasury Board Secretariat.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Like you, I do not know if I won the lottery. Be that as it may, the questions here are always relevant and serious, and it is a pleasure for me to answer them. The act states that there must be a new code and, consequently, a new policy on conflict of interest management.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Daphne Meredith provided you with the overview and our response to the Auditor General's report. I'd now like to briefly add some elements from the perspective of a deputy head and an accounting officer. The values and ethics code and the conflict of interest measures it contains set the overarching principles that apply to the public service as a whole.

Public Accounts committee  The statement was a statement of intent. It wasn't a policy. The policy, in fact, has been approved by the Treasury Board ministers. It was approved in June. June 2010 was the policy on financial management. The policy on internal control was approved in April 2009. So those are policies that are, in fact, approved by the Treasury Board, and they are the policies of the government.

Public Accounts committee  The other element, if I may comment, Mr. Chair, is the fact that at the request of Parliament, departments will also start producing quarterly financial statements, starting in 2011. The first financial statements will be produced in August 2011. So there is an additional requirement to produce information in terms of the transparency and the reliability of financial information, which is an added element that was not in place when the original commitment was made.

Public Accounts committee  In fact, I wanted to signal that Mr. Matthews had the information.

Public Accounts committee  I have two answers, Mr. Chair. Thank you. One is that the policy on internal control took effect on April 1, 2009, so the disclosure as requested by Madame Faille is not a surprise: this policy has, in fact, been in place since 2009. I'll stop at that.

Public Accounts committee  The decision was made further to the development and release of the policy, which sets out a new approach to conducting controls-based audits.

Public Accounts committee  When we first turned our attention to this matter, Mr. Chair, we focused on two objectives, as Ms. Faille so aptly pointed out. We wanted to strengthen control systems and increase the reliability, so to speak, of financial information. As these mechanisms and policies were developed, we completed phase one of the process, as Mr.

Public Accounts committee  The decision stems from the policies in place and the latest policy was released in 2010.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you. The challenges to be ready for a controls-based audit are essentially the same challenges as are embedded in the policies on internal control and the policies on financial management. That is why in the policy on internal control there is a requirement for the disclosure.

Public Accounts committee  Yes, we did discuss the policies that we developed. May I answer the other question, Mr. Chair?

Public Accounts committee  If you don't mind, Mr. Chair, I'd like to respond to the question the member put earlier.

Public Accounts committee  I'll answer this question as well. You're asking if the mechanisms or policies developed followed sound control rules?