Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, I might add a small point. There is not a single composite inventory of all reporting requirements, the 60 the Auditor General mentions in the report. I should make clear a couple of things. All Treasury Board policies that have reporting requirements are obviously pu

Public Accounts committee  Most definitely. In our management action plan tabled with the committee, we've certainly made it clear that it's our intention to do that. We'll move as quickly as we can, and every hope and expectation is that we'll get it done quickly. This is just a terribly small point. One

Public Accounts committee  I have nothing to add to that.

Public Accounts committee  Thank you very much for that question. This was alluded to a little bit earlier as a very important issue generally. I might just point out, looking at the reports that the Auditor General selected to report on, that two of them do already have built into them aspects that touch

Public Accounts committee  Thank you very much for that question. The issue of reporting burden has been with us for some time, as I mentioned, and we felt it was important to not just have our own opinion; we did consult with departments and agencies. In 2012 we brought together about eight departments a

Public Accounts committee  Most definitely. We accept the recommendation of the Auditor General, and we'll move on that recommendation.

Public Accounts committee  Yes. That's at the very latest. We're going to try to get it up before, but do it in a way that is as rich as possible so that it's as useful as possible.

Public Accounts committee  That's something we feel we should be doing as well, and we will be doing that. I did mention, and indeed it's reported in the Auditor General's report, that all of the reporting requirements are stated in policy, and I think the audit does make clear that there are clear timelin

Public Accounts committee  The groups that are largely responsible for undertaking the reporting activities within departments fall generally within back-office operations, as we call them. The government cost-containment initiatives tried to ensure that service to Canadians was not affected and that a maj

Public Accounts committee  No, it's a pleasure. We'll do whatever we can to help.

Public Accounts committee  That work is just being launched and is under way. In 2006 there was a very major review of the suite of Treasury Board policies. At that time we had about 180 Treasury Board policies. The Federal Accountability Act cut that number by at least half. Through that, we've brought a

Public Accounts committee  In each policy, there is now a clear architecture against the policy. It identifies what the deputy head of an organization is responsible for in any particular area.

Public Accounts committee  Underneath that we have standards and directives that address requirements that the senior officials, for instance, the chief audit executive, the chief financial officer, and the chief information officer, might have in their particular areas of responsibility. We also have a wh

Public Accounts committee  Thank you very much for that. I'll do my best, though it's not my particular area of responsibility. I hope, in doing so, to explain a little bit of some of the pertinent features of reporting. Like all of our reports, the requirement derives from the policy that the deputy hea

Public Accounts committee  Correct.