Public Accounts committee  No, it's a fair question, and from time to time when the situation you're describing has occurred, we've looked into the departmental budget and asked ourselves whether there needed to be some kind of adjustment. Having said that, I think the thing that will typically lead to lar

Public Accounts committee  I would add that if you're comparing the $29 billion to the $17 billion, it's roughly a $12-billion difference. There is $6 billion of that which actually relates to a contingency reserve that was included in the $29 billion. That was a forecast that was done in March 2016, at a

Public Accounts committee  We've traditionally included a contingency fund of about $3 billion, which in relation to combined expenses and revenues of about $600 billion is actually quite a small buffer in the grand scheme of things. At different points in time, the department and the government have chose

Public Accounts committee  Perhaps the only things to add are, one, that the department and the Bank of Canada devote some resources to forecasting both the inflows and the outflows so that the timing of our options for treasury bills and bonds is set up with a view of when in the calendar year cycle the g

Public Accounts committee  Yes, I can make it short. The answer to your question is that the 10-year government bond rate came in about 30 basis points lower than we had projected at the time of the budget. That is on page 1.3. There is the projection versus the actual for those interest rates.

Public Accounts committee  It is, and it's published as part of the budget now.

Public Accounts committee  It depends on why you're looking at the debt, and that really goes to what measure you want to use. Absolutely, if you're comparing across countries, the IMF calculation is the more appropriate one. It allows us to compare Canada to the United Kingdom, for example, which is a uni

Public Accounts committee  I completely agree with my colleague Mr. Matthews. In cases where that is appropriate, it is certainly a good investment. We have to admit, nonetheless, that there are some difficult cases in which the amounts cannot be recovered. Judgment must always be exercised in recovering t

Public Accounts committee  Yes, it would require a ministerial sign-off.

Public Accounts committee  To the extent that interest rates rise, naturally the debt charges on our market debt will increase. There will be an offset, however, from the actuarial value of the pension obligations, because as the discount rate on those obligations rises, the current service costs will be r

Public Accounts committee  That is the value of the insurance in force by the two private sector insurers that operate in Canada, that is to say, Canada Guaranty and Genworth.

Public Accounts committee  The $258 billion is the total insurance in force. The government has guaranteed, in the event that either of those companies would not be able to meet their obligations—so effectively go bankrupt—that after a 10% deductible was paid, the government would guarantee the mortgages i

Public Accounts committee  I would only say that the management's discussion and analysis tends to be a document that highlights the main trends in the public accounts, so be it with respect to debt, deficits, revenues, and spending. It tends not to be a guide to the public accounts. If that's something th

Finance committee  We have a program called the children's special allowances. It's precisely to deal with the issue of children in care. Through that program we provide provinces with funding to provide exactly the same benefit that other children will receive through the Canada child benefit. We'

Public Accounts committee  Just to be clear, going back to your last question, the limits for the mortgage insurers are $215 million for the two private sector mortgage insurers and $600 million for CMHC, of which CMHC has used $520 million.