[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Thursday, February 20, 1997
.0937 
[English]
The Chair: We can get started. I don't know if Mr. Williams is coming or not; he may be in the lock-up for the estimates. I will call this meeting of the Subcommittee on the Business of Supply to order.
The clerk has distributed a summary of Mr. Marleau's comments. He has also prepared a couple of amendments we might want to consider, based on our discussion at the last meeting.
What I would like to recommend to the committee is that we proceed as we were going through the report dealing with recommendation by recommendation. We might then be in a better position to make a firm decision on what then should happen on the last allotted day for debate and voting on the estimates.
One thing the committee might want to consider is if there are no major concerns....
Mr. Williams, thank you; I wasn't sure if you were going to be able to come or not.
Mr. Williams (St. Albert): My apologies, Madam Chair. You have picked a rather difficult morning for me.
The Chair: In addition to the minutes of our last meetings with Mr. Marleau, we have a summary prepared by Mr. O'Neal of Mr. Marleau's discussion with the committee. It contains some of the options we considered with him.
In your absence at the last meeting, we had begun to go through the recommendations and made slow progress, but we were dealing with one of the basic recommendations in the report. I was going to suggest we continue going through that and deal with everything we've dealt with up to the point of that last business of supply, and then try to resolve it. It may take one full meeting just to resolve that.
If there are no major concerns about the first part of the report, we might want to consider adopting that. It's primarily just descriptive background up to page 29. We might want to consider adopting that, subject to any editorial changes or any changes made necessary by subsequent decisions we make. And if we do that I would encourage members who have any comments about the preliminary part of the report, which is really just an introduction to the section with recommendations, to contact Mr. O'Neal directly and convey those comments to him.
.0940
Is there any problem with that? Can we consider that first part of the report over and done with?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin (Joliette): The first part is just historical background.
The Chair: Yes, exactly.
Mr. Laurin: So we mustn't contradict history.
The Chair: That's true, but we can interpret it.
Mr. Laurin: Yes.
[English]
The Chair: Do I need a motion for that? I guess it would be a wise idea.
Mr. Laurin moves adoption of the reports up to page 29, subject to any subsequent editorial amendments. Seconded by Mr. Williams.
Motion agreed to
Mr. Williams: There are some minor editorial changes that I may want to go through with the researcher - not a change of intent or content, but just some editorial stuff I may want to go through.
The Chair: Yes, I really encourage any of you who want to see some editorial change to get in touch with Mr. O'Neal directly. Then if there are any difficulties, he and I can try to pull it together and try to bring back to the committee anything we think needs to be clarified arising out of that.
So it's actually to page 31 halfway down the page. Wait a minute, though, I'm missing page 30 here, Brian. I'm missing 30 and 32. That's okay, I probably have the other version in here. Okay, so it's to the top of page 30, the first two lines on page 30, that we're adopting an editorial change for. Thank you very much.
The problem is we need this, because I think it's the one that has some notes on it.
Now perhaps Mr. O'Neal could give us a quick summary of where he thinks we got to so we can start from there.
Mr. Brian O'Neal (Committee Researcher): Madam Chair, at the subcommittee's last meeting there was a general discussion about this first section that deals with the proposed creation of an estimates committee whose principal job would be to oversee the review and reporting of the estimates. During that last meeting there was some concern, as I see it, expressed by some members that this committee might interfere unduly in the activities of other standing committees that are reviewing the estimates.
I pointed out at that time, and I believe you pointed it out as well, that there was an effort both in the text and in the recommendations to avoid this possibility. But I agreed at the time to review what was drafted here to make sure those concerns that were expressed are reflected in the text.
There was also some concern expressed about how this proposed estimates committee would actually function. It seems to me that again here we're dealing with a hypothetical. It's hard to say exactly how this will all work. A lot depends on the person who will be chairing the committee and the people who are sitting on it. A lot also would depend on the kind of response this committee would get from other standing committees. So it's impossible to say how those things would work out.
.0945
Therefore, at that time I suggested that there be a provision or a recommendation that the work and the mandate of the committee be reviewed at a certain interval. The chair suggested that this occur not during the upcoming Parliament, but during the subsequent Parliament. So I've drafted a recommendation for the subcommittee's consideration that calls for this review.
There is also a suggestion that the estimates committee be given a permanent mandate to televise its proceedings in order to give its work a certain profile.
With your permission, Madam Chair, I have copies of those two proposed additions to the recommendations. If we could have them distributed to the members now, they can consider them in greater detail.
Madam Chair, I would suggest that perhaps the committee might like to begin at the beginning of this section and work its way through the text, or, if it likes, through the recommendations.
I will point out that the recommendations were essentially adopted by the subcommittee prior to the Christmas break. Any changes made are changes that have been made in accordance with the desires of subcommittee members during the last few meetings.
Mr. Williams: Madam Chair, perhaps I could just respond. The memorandum just circulated proposing that a permanent mandate to televise these proceedings I presume means that they don't have to seek authorization to televise, but it does not require that every meeting be televised.
The Chair: No.
Mr. Williams: As long as that is understood.
The Chair: Yes, it's just to make clear that we think this is an important committee. I think the finance committee has a permanent mandate, does it not?
Mr. O'Neal: If not de jure at least de facto they seem to broadcast an awful lot, but I don't think they have a specific mandate, no.
The Chair: It would be a way of making it clear that we think this is a process the public should see more of, and it's a way of encouraging an estimates committee to make use of its ability without having to seek permission every time.
Mr. Williams: I'm not sure how the oversight of this permanent estimates committee will develop relationships with other committees. Also, I am willing to allow this to go forward, with the wrinkles to be addressed at a subsequent time. There is a potential for friction when you have two committees with some overlap with jurisdiction, but we cannot reconcile, recognize, or identify every potential problem at this point in time. Therefore, I think that is fair.
I'd like to raise another point, Madam Chair. Because the estimates are tabled by the government, and this is Parliament's response, I think it's only proper that the chair be a member of the opposition rather than a member from the government.
The Chair: It's not accountability. It's financial planning of the government's activities.
Mr. Williams: It's Parliament's review of the government's plans for spending. I'm not asking for a majority of opposition members or not even perhaps only opposition members, Madam Chair, but I'm asking to recognize the role in much the same way as the public accounts committee, which has a chair from the opposition. We should give serious consideration to the chair of this committee being from the opposition.
Mr. Laurin: The official opposition.
Mr. Williams: In line with the red book, of course, where the party in power wishes to share responsibilities to a great length. I'm sure you will find that very much in keeping with the red book promises.
.0950
Mr. Pagtakhan (Winnipeg North): I am tempted to favourably consider that, knowing the public accounts committee, a major standing committee of the House - equally on the expenditure, although ex post facto - is already now chaired by an opposition member. It would in fact ensure a balance if this committee continues to be chaired by the government of the day.
I agree with the chair that this is about planning. We know the nature of Parliament: the opposition holds to account the government of the day. But this is not a committee that holds to account. It is really a proposal. This is our plan. We are introducing potentially a mechanism for reallocation in a friendly fashion.
So I would sustain that we follow the useful tradition of this being chaired not so much to say by the government of the day, but not to specify in a sense, and therefore by the will of the committee. The committee really elects the chairman out of the membership of the committee unless so specified that the chairman ought to come from the opposition side.
So I would not like to put in a provision that limits the government members from chairing the committee - at least a committee that elects any chairman, except when it is deemed by convention of the Standing Orders that the chair must come from the opposition members.
Mr. Williams: I'm not sure, but I think Dr. Pagtakhan was saying that he was in favour of it being chaired by a government member to balance off the chairman of the public accounts comittee, who comes from the opposition side.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Perhaps I can modify it right there. I would rather leave it to the will of the committee, but not to make it prohibitive for a government member by stipulating that the chair may only come from the opposition members. I should put it that way.
Mr. Williams: The Standing Orders, as you know, Madam Chair, require that two of the three positions, chairman and two vice-chairmen, be from the government side. In the case of the public accounts committee, the Standing Orders do stipulate that the chair be a member from the opposition.
To continue my line of logic, one of the main reasons this committee has been debating all these issues is because I feel that Parliament is being co-opted, if I may say so, by government. The clear line of division between government and Parliament is becoming rather blurred. The government sometimes feels that Parliament will acquiesce to anything that it so desires, within limits of course.
It's not so much to say that it's opposition versus government but that it's Parliament examining the estimates. To ensure that we do not continue down the road of Parliament being co-opted into endorsing government measures, for that reason I feel the chair should be a member from the opposition side. It would give a clear identity to our vision that Parliament can make up its own mind. It has its own voice and it has its own opinion and it should be able to speak to government accordingly and hold government accountable in the estimates.
We had the budget brought down by the Minister of Finance. We had a vote in Parliament on the budget. That was just the other day. As a matter of fact, this morning the minister will be tabling the estimates in the House momentarily. This is the planned spending by government over the next year. Parliament will be asked to examine it, call in witnesses, listen to members of the bureaucracy on how these numbers come together, and listen to the minister justify the need for these expenditures in his department. Then Parliament will take that information and mull over it to come to a conclusion whether they will endorse it, or, as we would hope in this report, perhaps reallocate the money elsewhere.
.0955
Madam Chair, I would like to see a clear recognition that this is Parliament's role. It is not simply to endorse government's requests as we have seen over the last many years. The whole process of this committee is to arrest that process and give Parliament an opportunity to speak and be heard and have influence. That's why we strongly suggest, Madam Chair, that we have a chair from the opposition side of this committee.
[Translation]
The Chair: Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, given the testimony we have heard and specifically Mr. Marleau's last testimony, I no longer believe that a committee in charge of supervising the consideration of main estimates and reports is a solution to the problems that have been raised. Whether a member is sitting on one committee or the other, even if it's a supercommittee, if he or she doesn't have the impression that he can exert more influence over the course of events, I think we're on the wrong track here.
We would be better off supporting Mr. Marleau's recommendation to allow standing committees to make recommendations concerning the reallocation of funds. That may be an improvement, albeit very slight, over the way we do things right now. Creating another committee to coordinate other committees would be overlap. We'd only be displacing the source of frustration of members. They would not be any happier and they would not be any more interested in the budgetary approval process. Standing committees already exist and if we allowed members to have at least some influence over the reallocation of funds within those committees, that would be an improvement. It would be better than what would happen if we created another committee that would simply be a duplication, which would make the procedure weightier and would mean that members would think that another committee has no business giving them orders and interfering in their responsibilities and orientations. God knows that members of standing committees are generally those most competent to analyze an issue and decide on a course of action.
I fail to see how a coordinating committee could come to different conclusions from standing committees on a specific issue, unless it interfered in that other committee's business. I would far prefer not creating a new committee and leaving it up to existing standing committees by allowing them to make recommendations concerning the reallocation of funds.
[English]
The Chair: Can I just respond?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: If this course of action is followed, there's no point discussing who will become chair of that committee, since it won't exist.
[English]
The Chair: Let me just make a few comments. The amount of time this committee has had to spend on this whole issue of the estimates, the number of major reports we know that have been done for Parliament on the whole estimates, and the continuing frustration of members of Parliament around the estimates process says to me there is a need for an ongoing committee. It would be responsible for taking this whole business of how Parliament deals with the estimates in hand and be there on an ongoing basis to improve the situation and to improve the handling of the estimates. It would do it on a regular basis, not once every 10, 15, or 20 years. That to me is one of the main benefits of this committee. Otherwise, Parliament's always going to be behind the bureaucracy and the government in its ability to influence how money is spent.
.1000
Maybe we need some changes in the text to make it absolutely clear that their job is not to do the job of the standing committees, but to do those things that are not being done and cannot now be done by the standing committees.
I look at what we know and what we have dealt with about the changes that are being made by Treasury Board and the kind of information they give to Parliament, how that information is presented, what the voting procedures might be in the future, and I know that if there isn't a committee of this Parliament looking out for the interests of parliamentarians on this matter, then Parliament will be left behind.
How many reports have we done? How many times have we had to hear from Treasury Board? Had this subcommittee not existed, Treasury Board would have been able to change the procedures as it wished to. And I frankly think it was to Parliament's benefit that this subcommittee happened to be in operation when Treasury Board was proposing significant changes to how it reports to Parliament. That's happened several times during the time this subcommittee has been struck, even though that wasn't our prime mandate.
I would not like Parliament to be in the position of not having a committee specifically responsible for the management of the estimates process as we move possibly towards accrual accounting and different kinds of votes in Parliament. All of that is coming up in the next year or two. And if there isn't an ongoing committee that's protecting Parliament's interests in that estimates process, we're going to find ourselves, by the end of the next mandate in Parliament, with a loss of control by Parliament instead of an improvement in control by Parliament.
I make these comments having sat on both sides of the House and on both sides of the table at committee. My personal view is it's in the interests of the opposition and in the interests of Parliament that there be a committee that protects and improves this most essential role of Parliament. And if we have to do something to make clearer that it's not its job to take over the role of the standing committees, we can do that. But I would hate to reach this stage of the report and have a disagreement about one of our fundamental recommendations. That's why - because of that discussion last week - we've suggested that if an estimates committee is established its role and responsibilities would be reviewed five years after it's established. I would in fact say no later than five years after it's been established.
I see major changes coming down the road in reporting to Parliament, and I want to be sure that Parliament's interests are protected. My own personal view, and the conclusion the committee came to some months ago, is that this is the best way to do it, because none of the standing committees are going to do this.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, I would like us to draw a parallel with the responsibilities currently given to the Standing Committee on Finance, the Standing Committee on Public Accounts and the new committee we want to create. We could put the responsibilities of each of these committees on paper to ensure that they really have different mandates.
The mandate that we seek to give the new committee contains responsibilities that already belong to the two existing committees. At the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, on which I've sat, we systematically and almost exclusively examine the Auditor General's Report. So there will be no greater advantage here.
The Auditor General's Report is interesting the first week when it is published, but the rest of the year, we don't often feel very useful. We get the impression that we argue endlessly, we discuss philosophy, we waste our time, because there's nothing to change. We criticize the government, and once we've got that off our chest, we're defeated by the government majority of the committee. If that's we want to do, I don't think we're on the right track.
.1005
The Standing Committee on Finance can currently do that work as can the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, but they would have to have new powers that would allow them to reallocate certain expenses or votes. Prove to me on paper that the mandates of these three committees are really different. Tell me where the responsibility of each one begins and ends. Quite sincerely, Madam Chair, I have not been persuaded of the need for such a committee. It seems to me that the documents we have do not establish a clear need for such a committee.
[English]
The Chair: Mr. O'Neal has some comments to make.
Mr. O'Neal: Yes, Madam Chairman, I would like to respond to a few of the things Mr. Laurin has said.
First of all, it seemed evident from the witnesses who testified before the subcommittee that the problem involved in bringing about better scrutiny of the estimates is a complex one and it has several causes. Therefore, what the report tries to do is attack this lack of sufficient scrutiny on several fronts or levels. One has to do with the creation of this estimates committee, but further on we talk about what the clerk talked about, which was giving committees the authority to reallocate funds. On the basis of what the clerk said to the subcommittee, I think some of those recommendations could be strengthened and clarified. As a matter of fact, they should be.
The second point, having to do with the various responsibilities of the finance committee and the public accounts committee, and the desire to make sure the work of the estimates committee doesn't conflict with the work of these other two financial area committees, is pretty well spelled out in paragraphs 110, 111, and then further on, 115.
So there are descriptions of the mandates - mind you, they're fairly basic descriptions of the mandates - of the public accounts committee and the finance committee. The discussion of the mandate of the proposed estimates committee is also discussed in the text and then set forth in the recommendations. However, perhaps if the subcommittee felt it might be useful, we could put a table in the report that would list the duties of each one of these committees so people could make reference to it quickly and easily.
The Chair: As you have both been talking, it occurred to me one way we might allayMr. Laurin's concerns is if when we get to the section on giving committees the ability to reallocate funds we made it clear that the ability to reallocate funds within a departmental budget belongs only to the standing committees for that department. That would make it very clear that it's not an area for the estimates committee.
Dr. Pagtakhan.
Mr. Pagtakhan: From what I'm hearing, the argument used against the creation of a standing committee is the duplication of work, so when we proceed we have to show there will be no duplication of work. Two, because of that, there is a potential for conflict. Again, this goes with that, the need for cooperation you mentioned. Thirdly, not knowing who is supposed to do it could in fact lead to delay of the study of an estimate. So we have to have a specific response to that. Fourthly, I heard that an alternative proposal, which is in the draft report, is in fact a more viable option. So far, those are the arguments I heard against a standing committee.
.1010
The arguments for a standing committee are that it will provide an example of cooperation among various committees of the House. Two, it will see the big picture of the whole, and that knowledge will give us the ability to decide better on the reallocation. That is why I tend at this point to disagree with the chair that reallocation should be reserved only for the department. Here we have a better picture of the things, such as a program for youth internship, that may have already been done in other departments. I tend to disagree. Reallocation can be a very vital function of this estimate committee -
The Chair: Are you suggesting that as a -
Mr. Pagtakhan: - because we see the whole picture. Just take the youth internship program, in which all departments are involved. Maybe we, this overseeing committee, could say at one time that this program is really best handled by that department and not by this, that it is so minuscule why not remove it and use it for things like that. I would suggest that it in fact be reserved, because we see the big picture at all times.
The other argument is that it will address a specific problem that has been identified for us by the witnesses but somehow cannot be addressed by the existing system today. We have to make a very strong argument for that. In other words, if we can list the arguments for creating a standing committee, almost summarizing the many points that are already here so that people will see them right away, and then at the end of the day, as Brian has done very well, identify twelve or thirteen functions of the standing committee.... Then when we examine these twelve functions, along the lines of those you say are the functions currently of the standing committee, in a great way it will respond to the concerns that have been raised and will indeed prove that we were wrong in concluding what we concluded in the draft or that we were correct. We could also modify some of the functions.
I can see the point once I hear the argument about duplication of all those things.
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chairman, to add to that, in setting forth the estimates committee's mandate, there is no absolute requirement that it do all of those things. I think when they get down to doing their work, they're going to have to decide which things they can accomplish, which things they are unable to do, and which things they assign priority to. Then at the end of a five-year period, when a review is conducted, I think you'll have to determine whether this mandate is a realistic one or whether certain aspects should be removed and other tasks added.
This is all very hypothetical. A lot of how it will work will depend on the committee itself once it gets going.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Inherent in this is that those twelve functions you have identified as mandates of this proposed new standing committee do not duplicate any function of the standing committee in any way. Otherwise, I would agree that it is duplication.
[Translation]
The Chair: Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, let me refer you to the bottom of page 38 and the top of page 39 of the French version, which discusses the role that could be given to this new committee. The preceding paragraphs state that the Standing Committee on Public Accounts and the Standing Committee on Finance should be maintained, should not be merged, and that an effort should be made to justify the existence of the new committee whose responsibility it would be to consider the government's financial activities at the macroeconomic level. And here we get into philosophical discussion. It states more specifically that this committee would be given a mandate to coordinate consideration of the Estimates, of the budgetary process.
We don't influence government decisions very much when we discuss the budgetary process. Members want to know if there's any point to them discussing things that are not important, discussing procedure. They want to discuss content. They want to have some influence on the reallocation of votes and expenditures.
.1015
The document goes on to say that the new committee would take over from our subcommittee. Are we doing a job that you find very gratifying or very satisfying with regard to the reallocation of expenses? I don't think so. It says that the new committee would take over from the subcommittee. The subcommittee has examined the budgetary process and has heard suggestions on the way to improve it.
The paragraph ends by stating that "the continued oversight of the Plans and Performance processes be assumed by the new Estimates Committee".
Here again, we're talking about the operation of committees. Is that really what's missing to give value to the role of members of Parliament? Do we need another committee that will discuss the operation of other committee and to which we will send members who may have nothing to do elsewhere or who might find it more interesting to work on other committees?
Are we sure we found the right solution by creating another committee to look after that? It seems to me that this solution is not well adapted to the problem that was raised by the member. Members are not asking to do the same things differently at another committee. They are asking to do different things, even in the committees where they already sit. We have the roles of the committees here.
The Chair: In my opinion, there are other recommendations that deal precisely with the way the committees and members of committees can do things differently. That's only one of the recommendations. There are others that deal with the problem you've raised.
[English]
Dr. Pagtakhan.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, I was coming along the same line. At least twelve functions of this committee are envisioned. One of them is to review process. I think for the purposes of debating this very fundamental issue to create or not to create a standing committee, we have to look at each function and ask whether it is a legitimate new activity that will excite the members of Parliament and whether it is a desirable goal.
If it is not a desirable goal, we cancel it. So that does not exist as an argument. If at the end of the discussion none of the twelve envisaged here are desirable goals, the conclusion will be obvious. There is no need to create a new standing committee. If any one of them withstands the scrutiny of our debate, there is indeed a basis but one very focused on the particular function.
By starting those very individual functions that are envisioned - of course, the background material has been well summarized by the researcher - we can see and we can respond to them. In fact, one function I didn't even realize - obviously I read your document - and that is seeing the whole picture, the total picture. I say the big picture.
By way of suggestion, if this is only process, I might not be excited. In other words, if you look at the twelve -
The Chair: I'm looking for results, too.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes. One in itself may be good, but not good enough to proceed. But one may be so good in itself, so vital, they will proceed with it.
We really have to ask whether we agree to a function, one to twelve, yes or no. After the debate there may remain only three or four, or even one, and you will ask whether it is worth proceeding. Then you reach a conclusion. If you use the argument about all the processes, I will agree with you. But if I can see something else there that is good.... If you can add this one minor basis for a new committee and there is a major one, let's go ahead and give it a try.
.1020
I suggest we go over the twelve functions, one by one; otherwise, we will be jumping the argumentation. Is that a reasonable analysis?
The very first one, on page 34, is receive the estimates. Before we can receive them, we have to agree that the committee already exists, so let's forgo that one. Then let's go to page 35, paragraph 108 - to coordinate the study of the estimates. Do we agree to that? Let's ask. Before we go -
The Chair: Is this a problem that's been raised with us by our witnesses?
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, it is.
The Chair: I would say yes. It was certainly raised by a number of the standing committee chairs, who said they were dealing with only part of a program. Foreign affairs was a good example, but only one example. It was raised by many of our witnesses, who said an overview of government-wide spending in certain areas isn't being done properly because it doesn't happen within only one department or within one community.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay, so in this one there is a powerful argument. It says: ``with the agreement of the appropriate standing committees - to conduct its own reviews when this happens.'' In the recommendation it says ``when desirable, with the support and cooperation...''. We may have to use the word ``agreement'', because it is very clear that is the concern.
It mentions coordinating, giving advice, and undertaking a study of certain estimates. Coordinating the study of all the estimates is really one function, giving advice to certain standing committees is another function, and undertaking, when desirable, a particular review of certain estimates is a third function. So in this recommendation I can see three functions.
Do we agree to all, to any, or any combination? My own position at this point is that it can serve a useful purpose for all these three functions. Is this enough to have a standing committee? I reserve judgment. I have to see the other things. It's not exciting yet; it's only reviewing. I do not see the real need for the standing committee at this point, but this is a desirable function; in particular it addresses the specific problems identified by witnesses.
I'd like to hear from my colleague opposite.
Tentatively, would you agree that these are desirable goals to be achieved?
The Chair: [Inaudible - Editor]...the other question, that are not now being achieved.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, exactly. I will raise the -
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, those are objectives, but with the recommendations we have here, it's as if we were telling the new committee: Take the work already started by a standing committee and raise yourselves above the daily concerns of that committee to look at things in a broader way. Before you look at things in a broader way, you have to understand the problem experienced on a day-to-day basis. We do that on the standing committees.
How will this committee have a broader and more holistic view and see things differently without first examining the day-to-day problems encountered on one, two or three committees? That committee would repeat examinations already carried out by standing committees. It seems to me that when a committee has spent two, three, four or five meetings examining a problem, the members sitting on that committee are perfectly capable of rising above the day-to-day situation and arriving at a broader solution. Let me examine the other recommendations.
On pages 40, 41 and 43, there are more references to taking the recommendation of one committee and sending it to this new committee so that it can study it with a different philosophy or a broader view of things.
I'm telling you that this is a committee that will wax philosophical. It won't be able to change anything in votes and expenditures. This will be a study committee. It will study. It's mandate is so broad that before it finishes its consideration of the Estimates, another budget will have been tabled and there will be nothing left to change.
I really fear that this will not be very interesting for the members who will be asked to take part in such a committee.
.1025
I'm sorry, but I wouldn't want our committee to make recommendations that may seem innovative but are essentially pointless. If we consider something for hours and weeks, if we hear testimony and come to the conclusion that there is no political will to really change anything, we will have made some progress, I think. We will have noted that members are bored - that may be a strong word - or at least do not feel very useful within committees and don't feel capable of truly influencing decision-making. If there is no political will to change that, we will not pacify members with a new structure by telling them: Here's the solution to your problems of boredom or your feelings of uselessness.
The Chair: That's only one part of our recommendations.
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, I've pointed out three or four and it's always the same thing. We're always talking about work begun by another committee that's referred to this new committee which will take over by relay and do the same consideration, but in a broader way, at the macroeconomic level.
In my experience, when we struck a committee to consider the work of two or three other committees, we rarely arrived at practical solutions that led to some progress on an issue. It seems to me that that's not what members have asked for. I don't think that's the problem.
[English]
The Chair: Let me make a suggestion here. I think that Dr. Pagtakhan should be allowed to continue his examination of what roles this committee would fulfill. But let me make another comment here, that I think one thing Mr. Laurin is raising is the need to define more clearly the relationship between the standing committees and an estimates committee, if it were to be established. Maybe one thing we have to do is proceed with this almost on a hypothetical basis, realizing at the end we might disagree. Because I think Mr. Laurin seems to have changed his mind since before Christmas. We might disagree in the end, but at least we will disagree, having thought through all the problems and having tried to address those problems.
I think, frankly, there might be some room fairly early on here.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: That's what reflection is for, Madam Chair.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Wisdom goes with age.
The Chair: One, I agree with the opinion you put forward that it's the standing committees, which are involved with the intricacies of their departmental estimates, that can identify the problems. The difficulty is by the Standing Orders they're confined to their departments. They can't go beyond. They don't have the capacity to see whether this is a broader problem that affects other governments, and in fact is the core problem of how we do our business. The estimates committee could do that.
Maybe we need to specify what use the standing committees can make of this estimates committee to improve the process and their functioning. For instance, we've already identified that the standing committees really don't have enough expertise to do a good job on the estimates. Maybe this committee could provide that kind of support to the standing committees on request. But I do think we probably need to more clearly identify the relationship, and that will take a bit of work.
Dr. Pagtakhan, you wish to continue with your examination?
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes. I think we have to go, really, paragraph by paragraph. For example, after hearing the arguments, and they are very strong arguments, even paragraph 106 sustains all the arguments proposed by the colleague opposite.... It says it ought not to displace the standing committee because it is the one with the best expertise, etc. In other words, if the standing committee is doing all its work and has all the time, there is no need to have another committee to study the estimates. That's in paragraphs 106 and 107.
.1030
Then paragraph 108 says that ``some estimates do not get the scrutiny they warrant and that the Committee should be able - with the agreement of the appropriate standing committees - to conduct its own reviews when this happens''. So these three are interlinked.
But in regard to the question of coordinating, when everything is working is there still a need for a coordinating committee? What can we learn from it?
A coordinating committee will not duplicate any function to me, because it will only see A, B, C committees are doing their job properly. We have received this estimate, etc. That will be a very valuable function. So a coordinating function is okay.
Where it runs into a problem is to do your own study even with the agreement of a standing committee. If it is to coordinate and then to identify that a particular committee is not doing its work, perhaps the challenge should be put back to that committee to do their work but not to undertake that study because it can pass the buck on so-called minor issues that are not of interest to the new committee but have the flavour of a major issue.
In other words, when a standing committee is identified as not doing its function under a standing order, it must be told by the standing committee, in a very friendly way, listen, you have not really addressed this particular estimate. Why not?
Make that committee accountable to the House, because to assure that is done in cooperation, in agreement, I have the feeling that it will be only the so-called minor issues, and the estimate committee, with the ego it may have, will say no thank you. So it can be a great source of problems in the future.
So I will disagree with doing a separate study when we agree to paragraph 106 that the departmental standing committee has the inborn knowledge because it is able to develop that expertise over a period of time. Notwithstanding that you have to do it only with the cooperation of that standing committee, I would rather put that obligation again back to that standing committee.
The Chair: Maybe one of the notes I scribbled to myself here might deal with this: that at the request of a standing committee the estimates committee may....
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, I'm a little worried about that. I know this, that it may only be at the request. But in terms of a major political issue, a major estimate, a major program, I don't think any standing committee would like to give up something that's very juicy.
The Chair: And that's why if you put the onus on the standing committee it would be at the standing committee's request only that the estimates committee would take on particular projects.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, but I do not like a new committee being the leftover committee. I do not like that. I would rather it has the function or it doesn't have the function, and not a function assigned by a standing committee, even so-called requests or agreements.
I think it would be best not to, because that is a potential source of no, no, no. Can you do this? No, Mr. Speaker, we were not able to do this study. We requested a standing committee of the new committee. Unfortunately, it isn't able to do it itself, a legitimate excuse, it made the request. No. I don't think it would be a good management approach.
The Chair: So what you're suggesting, Rey, is take out -
Mr. Pagtakhan: Doing its own study.
The Chair: - undertaking reviews of certain estimates.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, even on its own, at this point.
The Chair: Yes, except we do want to get the availability for this committee to bring together the estimates of several departments and work with the committees -
Mr. Pagtakhan: Oh yes, it's still there.
The Chair: I think we have to make sure it's still there.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Oh yes, the coordination is still there to receive all the estimates. That's why function one is premised on the fact that there will be a new committee on the functions we have agreed to.
So I am defending action on the function one, receive all the estimates. It will come if we agree with all the other activities. There is no need to receive documents if it will have no other activity.
The Chair: Okay.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I agree with the coordinating function, but I would like to know just on the coordinating function, are you sold on that idea of not doing a study? If not, then we might as well make a conclusion on what will be our consensus on this.
The Chair: Rey, I wonder if we could go on to the next two sections, which also define functions of this committee.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I will go for coordination, but I will be against doing another study on its own.
The Chair: Of a single department.
.1035
Mr. Pagtakhan: Of a single department. Then we go to page 37 and we have five functions, starting with a regular review of the estimates process.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Excuse me, Mr. Pagtakhan. Could you identify the paragraph number instead of the page number?
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, paragraph 113.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I have six.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: I can see five conditions there: review the estimates process; review of plans documents; review the proposed expenditures on a program basis; review a proposed expenditure on a major policy area; review all committee reports on departmental plans; and then report to the House. That's a post-conclusion.
Mr. Laurin: That's six.
Mr. Pagtakhan: That becomes six. Yes, you're right. To receive a report will be the final conclusion. Do we agree?
The Chair: Brian may have a suggestion for a partial solution.
Mr. O'Neal: Yes, Madam Chair. Looking at this, it just occurred to me that really this recommendation deals with an overview of processes. There is one item in here that actually talks about the review of proposed expenditures on a program basis when more than one department or agency is responsible for delivery. That particular item doesn't deal with process necessarily, and perhaps it should be moved into the previous recommendation.
I'll go back to the previous recommendation of studying the estimates in standing committees. So that would talk about ``authorized to co-ordinate...'', including giving the advice, and perhaps it should say:
- to undertake reviews of proposed expenditures on a program basis when more than one
department or agency is responsible for delivery with the support and cooperation of the
appropriate standing committees.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, I agree it is misplaced here.
Mr. O'Neal: That would solve your problem with the idea that it should be this committee that should be taking the estimates of one department that are normally the responsibility of a standing committee and taking over their job -
Mr. Pagtakhan: Because it's more than one department....
Mr. O'Neal: - and here they're talking about across programs or a process.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Good, you read my mind. I like that, because it is something that is not being done or could only be done with difficulty by any standing committee. Of course the position here is editorial. So I like that function.
On a review of the estimate process, it is almost like an academic, pedagogical activity, but it's very important, because there is no committee today that reviews the estimate process in terms of efficiency. It's almost like an Auditor General, but on process. Is that right, Brian?
Mr. O'Neal: What we're talking about, in essence, is the committee taking over some of the work that's being done by this subcommittee. Also, by continuing to look at the process the committee would see if there are additional incentives that could be built into the process or see if there are certain irritants that exist that should be removed.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, and that is innocuous - potentially useful. It would be potentially valuable. Certainly it is worth a pilot project for the life of one Parliament to see, because we have a subcommittee looking exactly at this, but this one will be mandated to precisely produce that. It may produce a really valuable product at the end of a review period, or it may not. I will give it the benefit of the doubt that it may do such good things, so I will agree with that.
On the review of a program base when there's more than one department, I will agree to this, unless I can hear counter-arguments that will persuade me otherwise.
On major policy areas, a major policy area may only focus on one department or across departments. When it focuses only on one department, that properly belongs to the particular standing committee existing already. Again, avoid duplication.
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Mr. O'Neal: That's why we've added the phrase ``that affect all of government''.
Mr. Pagtakhan: So even policy areas in all departments, right...?
Mr. O'Neal: All departments across....
Mr. Pagtakhan: So if you consolidate this along that line, I will be persuaded. On departmental plans, again, on that basis...so as long as it is within that important-to-review process. It is important to review process in a sense. Right? Okay. I like that.
I'd like to hear the counter-arguments, if there are any.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I agree with those recommendations. When I try to see whether those recommendations respond to the problems presented, it doesn't work anymore. The current procedures have been criticized. They've been discussed on pages 26, 27 and following. In the first pages of our report, I'd noted a statement by Senator John Stewart. It's rare that I refer to the statements of senators, but this time I'd found it appropriate.
Senator Stewart tells us that the adoption of the current procedure for considering estimates was essentially motivated by a will to improve the operation of the House of Commons and not to ensure better scrutiny of the expenditures proposed by the government.
The Chair: What paragraph are you referring to?
Mr. Laurin: Paragraph 11. This is a good summary of the problem that we wanted to pose at the beginning of our subcommittee examination. What we're trying to improve is the consideration of the expenditures proposed by the government and not the operations of the House of Commons.
In these recommendations, laudable things are discussed. Indeed, it's a good idea to examine the process periodically, to review our procedures on an ongoing basis and see if committees function well. All that could be referred to a supercommittee, but it seems to me that that's not what we wanted to do. It is my impression that that's not the problem that we sought to solve when we began our examination, if memory serves me.
Dr. Pagtakhan, this is as if you were determined to cure my headache when I'm telling you that my concern is my stomachache. It's all very nice to want to relieve a headache, but my stomach hurts more. This is my feeling about these recommendations.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: I agree that on any goals that we have to decide on and say yes or no to, the objectives have to serve the ultimate goal - that is, what the mandate is we are trying to achieve for this subcommittee.
We all agreed it is about a better and more meaningful scrutiny of the estimates. We must not lose sight of that. If we believe that some of the goals will improve the performance of the House, I don't think if we have discovered something good along the way in pursuit of that primary goal we should set it aside. If we decide not to pursue that, it depends on the committee.
The reason I'm saying that is if it doesn't really improve the performance of the House, so be it, we have discovered something good along the way. I will not throw away that piece of gold because I was searching for a piece of silver. I will still take the piece of gold on the road and give it to the House and say I found a piece of gold for us and let our mother committee decide.
.1045
Having said that, this improvement in the process for the House as a whole may also go back to the open objective of a better scrutiny of the estimates. I will not preclude the function of these ancillary steps to pursue a greater goal, which is a better scrutiny of the estimates.
I agree with you that we are focused on that reallocation perhaps, or even on completely changing. When we come to the real meat of that, then this will be the more exciting component.
With your permission, if I can hear from you, indeed, that this is to improve the process of the House, so it will be adopted on that basis, primarily.... Secondarily, it may also achieve an ancillary role in this instance of providing a better scrutiny of the estimates eventually.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Mr. Pagtakhan, if we want to improve the operations at the House of Commons, we have to give the least possible powers to the committees. It's a chore for the House to have committees that make recommendations that can eventually delay adoption of certain measures in the House. It delays things. That's why there have been so many examinations of the procedure with a view to limiting the influence of committees on the House. It was so the budget would not be adopted too late. There were specific dates to be respected.
Therefore, our committee has found a procedure that ensure the House will not be too inconvenienced. The ultimate objective is the smooth operation of the House. It is not the satisfaction of the members of Parliament in their work in committee. I always understood that the problem that was put to our subcommittee was to try to find a way to make members more interested in their committee work. It's not by giving them a more comfortable chair, soft drinks and coffee that we can accomplish that. That's only window-dressing. That's not what's going to make them more interested in committee work. It's what the committee actually does that interests the member. Through this work, will the member have an opportunity to have a greater influence over government decisions? I would like us to make recommendations that would improve that aspect. I don't find that in these recommendations.
[English]
The Chair: Let me try to get them for you.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Let met point out that I'm not blaming anyone. It may be up to us, and not only the officials, to make the right recommendations.
[English]
The Chair: Why? One of the main reasons we came to the conclusion a few months ago during our discussions about the need for this committee was for the need to constantly improve the ability of the members of Parliament to influence. That was, to me, at the core of why this committee was needed, because otherwise this subcommittee would dissolve. Fifteen years from now the same frustrations will surface and somebody will say let's have another subcommittee.
That, to me, was the core purpose of this committee: to look on a continual basis at the estimates process and how to make it more effective for members of Parliament. Perhaps we need to make that a little clearer as the core reason for this committee. All these other things are functions it performs toward that goal.
While our purpose hasn't been to improve the functioning of Parliament, we've clearly concluded that the way Parliament deals with the estimates is part of the reason the members of Parliament don't have any incentive or have very little incentive to take an interest in it. So if we can improve the functioning of Parliament, it's not to improve the functioning of Parliament, it's to change it so that it allows the members of Parliament to be more effective, in my view, and not because it's nice to tinker with the rules of Parliament. That's been our whole purpose here.
The problem is at the moment I feel we've hit a snowbank. We're trying to go in reverse, and I'm not sure that is the best way to go. We should continue plowing through the snowbank to get to those bits of gold and silver, but also to get to the meat of things like the ability to reallocate. That would be a major change here.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I agree, Madam Chair.
The Chair: This is something else that goes along with this. It's not the total answer. It's one part of moving forward.
I don't think we're going to have a total answer here. These frustrations will still be there. We're recommending some changes that might improve it, and that's all we're doing.
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I think the recommendation on reallocation is a major change, whether we roll the establishment of the committee into the responsibilities of another committee, identifying important functions around estimates, the most important of which is to have an ongoing mandate to improve the handling of the estimates by committees and by Parliament so that members of Parliament feel they have a meaningful and important role to play.
That's my summary of it.
Mr. Loney (Edmonton North): If we can bring about an awareness, we've accomplished something.
The Chair: Exactly. Having an ongoing committee like this would help that, John. Thank you.
I'm going to ask Mr. Laurin to suspend for a moment his agreement or disagreement and ask that we proceed hypothetically. If such a committee were to be set up or if these responsibilities were to be given to an existing committee, what's the best way we could make it function? I think the change we made in putting more emphasis on standing committees is one. Can we go through the recommendations pretending that we're going to do it? We may in the end agree to disagree, but if we agree to disagree and the majority of the committee wants to continue, then at least you will know that we haven't messed it up so badly that it can't possibly work. Okay?
Mr. Pagtakhan: I would propose that we proceed to paragraph 115, 116 through 122, the recommendations thereafter -
The Chair: May I suggest one change in 113? Halfway down that paragraph we're suggesting a mandate to review proposed expenditure in major policy areas. It's really not necessarily policy areas. For instance, information technology is not really a policy area. I think the key emphasis there is major expenditures that affect -
Mr. Pagtakhan: More than one department.
The Chair: It's not necessarily all government, but just some change in wording there.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes. Brian was alluding to that when you were somewhere else.
Paragraph 115.... I'd just like to reconcile these three. How do these differ in a major way to work jointly with either or both of the committees to examine broad issues of government-wide expenditures? I thought that was already addressed in the preceding one.
Secondly, on the function 11 under paragraph 116, the recommendation, are they not about details of more or less what has been discussed already in the previous paragraph 113 set of recommendations that you are transferring to the other function, and crown corporations? Those are the only three I noted here. Are they really specific, or are they about the same? I think crown corporations are different.
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chair, if I may, with regard to Dr. Pagtakhan's second point, what this recommendation after paragraph 116 does is it emphasizes something that is already implicit in the arrangements. But here it's an encouragement for standing committees when they encounter certain problems or frustrations in the course of their examination of the estimates that they report those concerns to the estimates committee, which could then address some of those concerns in its report to the House. One of the tasks that has been suggested for the standing committee is that it look for ways to improve the processes surrounding the examination of the estimates. In theory, this would help it to fulfil that particular task.
Mr. Pagtakhan: So on the basis that it is to serve one ultimate objective, yes, that should stay there. Again, the idea is to consolidate as much as possible so there are not too many specifics. But I think they will be clear when they are enumerated one after another.
Paragraph 115 - to work jointly with the Standing Committee on Finance and the Standing Committee on Public Accounts.
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Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chair, I agree with Dr. Pagtakhan. There may be some repetition there of sentiment that has been expressed earlier. With the subcommittee's permission, next week I will look at possible ways of amending that to make it look....
Mr. Pagtakhan: More tidy.
Mr. O'Neal: That's right - as I will be doing for this entire section, by the way.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay.
The Chair: May I take a moment to see how long people have? Since the Standing Committee on Procedure And House Affairs isn't meeting this morning, I'd hoped we might go until noon. Is that possible for everybody? We just need to know for the translators, to make sure they can continue.
Some hon. members: Agreed.
The Chair: So until noon-time then.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes.
Crown corporations - is that something you see as a potential role for a new committee?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: In paragraph 116, I see something interesting, but which may also be a huge trap. It says that when standing committees report on the estimates, they will flag topics that they feel should be drawn to the attention of the Estimates Committee.
Let me refer to my experience at the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. I can imagine a situation where members of the Public Accounts Committee had found an interesting bone. Will those people tell the budget committee: here's an interesting bone; we're going to give it over to you so that you can pay special attention to it?
That's what I understand in this paragraph. Will the Standing Committee on Public Accounts, or the Standing Committee on Finance, having found an interesting bone, not be more likely to say: I'm going to pay attention to this bone and I will give other topics that I find less interesting to the Estimates Committee and tell it to pay special attention to those topics.
Doesn't this new committee run the risk of becoming a depository for problems that no one wants to deal with in-depth or that simply require camouflage? We had a similar experience regarding a subject we discussed at the Public Accounts Committee. We said: Let's send this to the Finance Committee, I forget the topic.
The Chairman: Family trusts.
Mr. Laurin: Yes, family trusts. The Public Accounts Committee wanted to dig into that and the committee said: Let's send this to the Finance Committee. Would this be a third committee to which such topics could be sent, sometimes with a view to examining them in greater depth, but other times with the intent of sweeping them under the rug? In such circumstances, it would be possible to appoint to these committees the people that are required to control the situation properly.
I'm afraid we're in for a repetition of the situation we have right now.
[English]
The Chair: I think Mr. O'Neal indicated that based on this discussion he was going to try to do some rewording to clarify the role of the standing committees. I think what we've clearly come down to is if it's anything that falls within a department it should be handled by the standing committee, but the standing committee could draw to the attention of the estimates committee issues that affect its department and others as well, or that it feels its estimates are constrained by what's happening in another department and it has no mandate to look at that other department, but the estimates committee would have.
What we might want to do - and I agree - we may want to clarify quite a bit the relationship between the standing committees. Let me give you a good example: les fiducies familiales. Public accounts and finance have two different roles there. The finance committee - and I was just looking at the Standing Orders again - is responsible for anything to do with the Department of Finance, but only the Department of Finance. It doesn't deal with Treasury Board, and it doesn't deal with other departments.
.1100
In the issue of family trusts, it was legitimate for the finance committee to look into the policy on family trusts and whether it needed to be changed. The difficulty came - and I think it was made into more of a difficulty than it really was - because the public accounts committee also has has a legitimate mandate to hold the Department of National Revenue and the Department of Finance accountable for how they implement government policy and whether in fact money is lost that should not be lost. So theirs is definitely a backward looking; their job isn't to fix the problem except to recommend how to avoid losing money again in future.
That's simplifying it a bit, but if we want a change of policy on how family trusts are legislated and regulated in this country, that's the role of Finance. To me, the simple solution would have been to set up a joint subcommittee and let them go at it and come up with a joint solution, both.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: If our committee had existed at that point, would we have said: now that we have the opinion of the public accounts and finance committees, we will have to send this to the supercommittee so that it can examine this from a macroeconomic standpoint?
[English]
The Chair: No, no, because this committee has nothing to do with anything except the estimates and the estimates process. It doesn't have to do with setting policy -
Mr. Pagtakhan: I think there is an inherent problem when one committee can refer to another committee to do an undertaking identifying a problem. It can be passing the buck, offloading an unjuicy issue. The estimates committee presumably can also refuse. In other words, a coequal committee almost of the House getting a reference from another committee would be a very new change in the procedural approach.
Would it not be best for that committee, having identified the problem, to immediately go to the House and let the House determine whether it should be referred to any other committee? In other words, it should not be automatic that we can receive a report from another committee, or that the committee can assign it to another committee.
The Chair: It's not assigning it, it's just making the estimates committee aware. It's reporting to it that this problem exists.
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chair, just as a suggestion, what you could do with that particular recommendation is perhaps to specify.... The preceding text talks about content and form and process. The recommendation, rather than reading ``any concerns they have regarding areas the estimates committee should devote special attention to'', could be amended by saying ``any concerns about process, content and form of the estimates''. That would narrow it down considerably, so that other concerns perhaps about the appropriateness of giving a particular issue to a standing committee to study, rather than another standing committee, wouldn't fall into that.
Mr. Pagtakhan: It was on process, and what else?
Mr. O'Neal: Basically, the wording that's used in the preceding paragraph, so that it would be a specific reference to the process of examining the estimates, or their form and content.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Or format.
Mr. O'Neal: Format perhaps would be better than content, yes.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay. I have no problem, because I agree this one potentially is a source of continuing conflict as it's written. Because I think we have agreed that you would have likely duplicated any standing committee's function at this point, potentially. So this is to be significantly modified.
Mr. O'Neal: Yes, to bring it better into line with the -
Mr. Pagtakhan: Consensus.
Mr. O'Neal: - thoughts that are expressed in the earlier....
Mr. Pagtakhan: How about crown corporations? Do we have any observation on that? Is that a legitimate function for a new committee?
[Translation]
The Chairman: It's on page 41 in English and in French...
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Paragraph 132.
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chair, as an observation, I point out to subcommittee members that this section was put in in response to concerns expressed by some witnesses that crown corporations weren't receiving adequate scrutiny.
.1105
This section of the report basically proposes the compromise between what the witnesses seemed to want, which was to establish a special committee to look at crown corporation expenditures, and the current situation in which standing committees have certain responsibilities with regard to crown corporations. This looks for some middle ground.
I might add that this section of the report probably could be taken out if the committee members feel that it's inappropriate for an estimates committee to do this kind of work.
The Chair: We're prepared to hear from Mr. Laurin.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: It seems to me that the Public Accounts Committee already has the power to do that. There's nothing stopping the Public Accounts Committee from conducting that kind of examination.
[English]
Mr. O'Neal: I don't know whether it will help, but I will read out of the Standing Orders the mandate of public accounts. It says:
- Public Accounts shall include, among other matters, review of and report on the Public
Accounts of Canada and all reports of the Auditor General of Canada which shall severally be
deemed permanently referred to the Committee immediately after they are laid upon the Table;
and any other matter which the House shall, from time to time, refer to the Standing Committee.
I do think what's proposed here is somewhat different in that it discusses crown corporations collectively in terms of overall mandate and role. Again, as I say, my suggestion is that this is not something that need necessarily be seen as a vital aspect of what a proposed estimates committee would be doing. This is an additional task, which has been placed in the report at the suggestion of some witnesses.
The Chair: To go back to our core purpose here, I think what we want to go to the heart of here is that, yes, the public accounts committee can look at the public accounts reporting of crown corporations or at any Auditor General's report. What it doesn't have the mandate to do without specific direction from Parliament is look at whether Parliament has enough influence over the spending of the crown corporations; it also won't have enough control over how well they are financially managed or adequate information about the crown corporations in general to make sure that Parliament can exercise its control in advance over what resources are allocated to them and how they're spent.
John.
Mr. Williams: The public accounts committee is the committee that looks backwards to what has transpired. We're looking at this mechanism of an estimates committee that looks forward to what is anticipated to happen through estimates, budgets, and so on.
Crown corporations have become a major factor of government policy, and crown corporations are basically in business. Like any other business today, if they are to be well managed, they have a business plan, they have a focus, and they have a clear methodology by which they wish to conduct a business and implement the public policy. I think over the years they have in some ways lost their way. I see this committee ensuring that these corporations have a well-developed business plan; know what their role is; and understand the role between public policy, which is their mandate to implement, and the business they are in. I think this type of estimates committee should have the authority to examine these plans and senior management and report their findings to Parliament.
.1110
The Chair: Could I put this into the context of the discussion we had in your absence? We've asked Mr. Laurin to suspend his disbelief about whether we should or shouldn't have an estimates committee and to help us as we work through it, so that if in the end we have to agree to disagree and there is a recommendation by a majority for an estimates committee, he will at least have had his input in making sure we don't make foolish mistakes in how we set it up.
A big part of our discussion has been to clarify the role of the standing committees versus the estimates committee. Our researcher is going to do some work on the wording and whether we need additional clarification in the recommendations to make that very clear.
I think where we came to on the crown corporations.... For example, CBC is clearly a crown corporation under the mandate of the Department of Canadian Heritage. It would therefore be the mandate of the heritage committee to be responsible for reviewing the estimates of the CBC as a crown corporation.
It would be similar for every other crown corporation. If it's attached to a department, it's the standing committee for that department that reviews its estimates.
I think the purpose of this recommendation is the broader issues that affect crown corporations in general and Parliament's ability to influence and have adequate information about their expenditure. For instance, I don't know the last time the Financial Administration Act was reviewed for what it said about the financial management of crown corporations.
There's other legislation affecting how crown corporations in general operate, but I think the prime intention here would be that the standing committees would continue to do the detailed review of estimates of crown corporations. The estimates committee would look overall at whether Parliament has adequate information and adequate opportunity to influence the expenditures of crown corporations and to be reasonably assured that they are operating in accordance with Parliament's direction for dollars and programs.
Mr. Williams: Thank you for that clarification. As I mentioned at the beginning of the meeting, there will be some ironing out of the overlap between this committee and the other standing committees. I think this estimates committee, while it will supervise the review of the estimates by individual committees in springtime, will continue throughout the rest of the year to look at statutory program spending through program review, long-term business plans of crown corporations, and tax expenditures, which basically don't show up anywhere but as we know are a major part of public policy today.
So there are four major areas to be examined to ensure that Parliament is provided with the proper information and has the proper avenues to express its opinions. That's what I'm trying to achieve through this exercise, Madam Chair. I want to be able to have some mechanism whereby we can ensure that long-term business plans are well defined and well developed and that the institution is properly managed.
I understand the role of the individual committees as far as the public policy part is concerned; however, if we are looking at this estimates committee, I would like to have minimal turnover and try to develop a level of expertise. Perhaps the business management of the crown corporation could be part of the mandate of this committee.
.1115
The Chair: The general regime for business management of crown corporations as opposed to getting into the nitty-gritty of a particular crown corporation, except as it's relevant overall - is there adequate control here?
Mr. Williams: Yes. I see a role for the individual committees as far as public policy is concerned. But at the same time we're trying to develop a level of expertise in this committee. It will have the capacity to oversee management. That may be the division that will settle it. I don't know, Madam Chair.
Mr. Pagtakhan: The crown corporations do not submit part III of the estimates. That's one distinction. They only table summaries of their corporate plans, as has been said.
What again is part III?
Mr. O'Neal: Part III is the detailed spending plans.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, it's the detailed spending plans, the plans that will allow us to look for possible reallocation.
Mr. O'Neal: Yes, that's correct, although I think it's important to realize that crown corporations will often supply this kind of information in other forms, such as their annual reports.
Mr. Pagtakhan: That is post factum.
Mr. O'Neal: Yes. I hear they were required by the Financial Administration Act to table summaries of their corporate plans and operating and capital budgets. I can't specify at this time exactly when those are provided, but I can take a look and see.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, you may take a look at that. But the summary is somewhat different from the other things that departments prepare. There's a bit of degree of autonomy. I know that the current Financial Administration Act makes it, although at arm's length, sort of policy-wise accountable to the respective ministry.
I'm just trying to think aloud. Is there a danger in completely transferring this authority to scrutinize these estimates to this committee; in other words, that all departments will agree this is best done by this standing committee? If the expertise is there.... We're still all members of Parliament. There can be substitutes. Why can this not be conceded, to avoid duplication, as solely a prerogative of the estimates committee? What's the downside to that? I'm raising it as an issue.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: With regard to substitutes, I think that that goes against a recommendation that had been made by a witness, who suggested precisely more stability and continuity among committee members.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes, I agree with you. I remember I said that.
Mr. Williams: To answer Dr. Pagtakhan's question, Madam Chair, as I said, there is an element of public policy that each crown corporation is mandated to fulfil. That's why it is a crown corporation. That public policy is best supervised by the particular standing committee. Heritage Canada and the CBC was the example we brought out earlier.
The other point is there's quite a short timeline between the tabling of the estimates today on February 20 and their approval before the end of June. Therefore, I don't think a new committee on the estimates would want to reserve for itself, and itself alone, the supervision of the estimates. I would see it more as an advisory and supervisory role, working with the individual committees to ensure they are taking the best advantage of the information provided to question the people involved regarding the estimates and issues they would like to raise.
The estimates committee - if we create one - would then, as I say, as far as crown corporations are concerned, pick up these business plans that are tabled at other times of the year. Only summaries are tabled, and there is very little opportunity for committees to hold senior management or the management of the crown corporations accountable.
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I would like to see a better methodology, and I can see it coming in through this estimates process as the work of this committee on a year-round basis, of examining these business plans and the competence of senior management to manage the business and implement the public policies.
Mr. Pagtakhan: But you don't think that where the standing committee has the time it is best able to do that function?
The Chair: John, I really have a problem with that, because I think it's the standing committee.... To continue that example, the CBC is a crown corporation that exists to fulfil certain government policies and parliamentary legislation. It seems to me that the committee directly responsible for culture, for example, is in the best position to determine in a detailed way whether the estimates of the CBC corporation and how they're being allocated still fulfil that public policy purpose.
Where I see a problem here, and maybe we do want to see a slightly different wording, is the crown corporations don't table part IIIs. Is that still appropriate? For some it probably is, because there's commercial confidentiality; for others it's probably not appropriate. So I think there is a role for an estimates committee - if it's established - to look at whether the reporting mechanism of the crown corporations, and the means by which they receive their appropriations from Parliament, is adequate to allow Parliament to do its job.
Maybe we need some rewording to make clear that's what we're getting after. I don't think we can envision the estimates committee getting into the details of the operation of the CBC, as an example, or the National Capital Commission. But somebody has to get into whether there is adequate parliamentary control on the business of crown corporations and the money we get.
Mr. Williams: I agree with that statement, Madam Chair, but I wouldn't want the role of this committee - if we create it - to be restricted to a review of the Financial Administration Act.
The Chair: No.
Mr. Williams: I see it as a catalyst to ensure that these summaries of business plans - as they are tabled - are picked up by Parliament, or Parliament has the opportunity to pick them up and review them in detail, and call witnesses accordingly.
The Chair: Committees do, though.
Mr. Williams: They do and they don't.
The Chair: I mean, they have the opportunity.
Mr. Williams: They have the opportunity and it's not being fulfilled. This is all part of the whole estimates process that has been bypassed by parliamentarians because they have felt that they had no input into the process. Be it right or wrong, that is the perception they have, Madam Chair.
There is no opportunity for any committee to really have an in-depth review of the management of a crown corporation. It's not easy for someone to do it. I would like it to be a matter of course that these reviews would be perhaps cyclical, not necessarily annual, but certainly cyclical.
The Chair: Maybe we should do something like we did with statutory spending, and look at the overall problem and how this estimates committee might address it. I think it's fair to admit that we don't have a solution, but it's something the estimates committee could look at. At the same time, one of our recommendations could be that standing committees pay greater attention to the crown corporations falling under the mandate of their department. We could draw to their attention the availability of business plans and so on.
Maybe Brian could work on it, and make clear that there are two different problems here, that we haven't been able to totally resolve it, but that it is something that needs to be continued to be looked at.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin.
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, I agree with you. I don't think that we can hand over the estimates to that committee and at the same time give it a mandate for general coordination as well as a more specific mandate about the business plans of a Crown corporation.
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When we reach that stage, we need people who are very familiar with that Crown corporation. I don't think any members of this future committee would have the necessary expertise to do that kind of work. Let met take the example of the CBC or the Canada Post Corporation. I don't think that we can find members of Parliament who have the necessary expertise to deal with both those subjects at once. Therefore, we will not be able to give to this committee the mandate that Mr. White would like to see, nor do I think it would be desirable, because there would be overlap between standing committees and the Estimates Committee.
[English]
The Chair: At the same time, maybe this is something we need to define for the estimates committee, that it may set up joint subcommittees. For instance, they could decide that to get to the nub of a problem about crown corporations, and how well they are or aren't managed, requires them to take a selection of different kinds of crown corporations and have a special look at those. But they should only do that, in my view, by bringing in, if one were the CBC, the heritage committee, or if one were transportation and if one were a fishing crown corporation, then it would seem to me the estimates committee might want to approach those committees and say we think it would be helpful in improving the management of crown corporations if we had a look at these three corporations, but we want to do it by setting up a subcommittee with members from your committee who know these crown corporations well.
Maybe that's going beyond where we need to in this report, because I don't know that we're ready to do that, but I think we need two recommendations there to make them clear.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I noticed in the notations of the witnesses that a substantial amount is being spent, so it's a subject that needs greater scrutiny. Something that warrants closer parliamentary scrutiny should be assigned to a single committee. Then one author, and some others, recommended receiving the annual reports as opposed to including business plans. The recommendation called for the ability to refer this report to the appropriate standing committees that would be able to investigate the mandate and conduct of crown corporations.
If we look at receiving the reports for a coordinating role that is important, it can serve the function. You have to have the data to be able to coordinate something. To refer this to the appropriate standing committee, again I would not like one committee to be able to refer it to another committee, because the committee should always report to the House, make its recommendation, and let the House determine it as the ultimate authority.
In regard to investigating the mandate and conduct of the crown corporations and examining their executives and boards of directors, were we to allow the standing committee to also have that function then a new committee should not assert that function because it will be a good example of duplication of functions. So we have to make a choice: should it continue to be with a standing committee also as well as us? I would disagree with that, because it's a perfect example of duplication of work.
The Chair: I think it's become pretty clear that we have to separate this out into two different recommendations. We must make it clear, again based on the total discussions from our last two meetings, that the specific estimates of a specific crown corporation belong to the standing committee. The estimates committee is responsible for the overall strengthening of Parliament's role in the appropriations for the crown corporations. But we may in fact want to recommend, if it's not already done, that the annual reports and the business plans of the crown corporations when they're tabled in the House of Commons are deemed referred to the appropriate standing committee. No? We can't do that?
Mr. O'Neal: I'm not sure.
.1130
Mr. Williams: Madam Chair, are you therefore suggesting there is no role in this new estimates committee created for crown corporations?
The Chair: No.
Mr. Williams: If there is, I didn't quite catch where -
The Chair: You're on one end of it. You want this estimates committee to be able to dig into the details of departmental estimates. Mr. Laurin is on the other end. He doesn't want an estimates committee at all - just leave all of that to the standing committees.
I think we're trying to come down somewhere in the middle, clarifying that the standing committee still has primary responsibility for the estimates of its department and the role of the estimates committee. I think we're trying to do the same thing here.
The primary role with respect to crown corporations and their detailed estimates is with the standing committee. But the estimates committee should be looking overall at whether the crown corporations have adequate accountability...not accountability to Parliament, but does Parliament have adequate control over the allocations to the crown corporations and the determination of how those allocations are to be spent?
An estimates committee might at times have to take a few specific crown corporations and tell the standing committees that they would like their involvement in helping to look at it as a sample of...so that we can....
As we said, if this is something new, I don't think we can predict where it might be two or three years after.
I think Rey was next.
Mr. Pagtakhan: To pursue the earlier discussions we had - and John was not here for them - where a function properly belongs to one standing committee, whether it does it efficiently or not, I think the principle in following your suggestion is that it ought to remain with that committee. Let that committee be accountable to the House. Where an activity is with more than one department, this new estimates committee should have a role. I agree with that.
The crown corporation is an activity that is really identified, to begin with, with a particular department, as you said. So following the earlier discussion and sentiments, it ought properly to belong to the particular standing committee.
What we have not addressed with that, and I'd like to ask the opinion of my colleagues, is this: the observation of the need for a macro-level review of the collective role and mandates - page 40, paragraph 122, to page 41 - of the activities and financial monitoring of crown corporations. This is looking in total.
In other words, a crown corporation is seen as one department in a real sense because it is an extension of a department, although arm's length. So when it involves more than one department, we already have the sentiment that a new committee could have a role. When it involves the interaction between corporations, I can see it as an extension of that logical thinking.
However, do we foresee it happening? We do not know, because I don't think there is any development expertise. Where I can see it playing a role in terms of efficiency, management and accountability is this: is it possible that one crown corporation is efficient in a way that the other corporations in the country may not even know of, and why not? I can see that there is no expertise because there is no collective one.
Now for a moment, forget about this new estimates committee with these functions. We could have a completely new committee that would focus only on crown corporations and call it the crown corporations standing committee of the House - just that, no coordinating role. It will only look at crown corporations. It may be one function.
When you come to think of it, how can an estimates committee do all these roles over a period of time, reviewing estimates of many departments? The task may be so huge that it can only do one task in any given year. In the four-year life of a Parliament it might not be able to do.... It could be a source of frustration. If we really identify that there is potential for good efficiency, accountability, knowledge and involvement of Parliament, maybe there ought to be a standing committee on crown corporations.
Now I'm throwing you another point.
Mr. Williams: I'm not sure I would like to go as far as Dr. Pagtakhan.
The Chair: A hundred committees would be nice.
.1135
Mr. Williams: We wouldn't want to have a proliferation of committees to just go after every issue.
But let me go back to the point you were raising, Madam Chair. I fully agree with you that the estimates belong in the respective standing committees for crown corporations. I am more concerned about ensuring that there is a methodology that gives Parliament authority to express its will over the crown corporations.
As I mentioned, virtually all crown corporations are operating in the business sector and have a public policy mandate to implement at the same time. Because of that public policy mandate, they are not subject to the vagaries of the marketplace, where if you don't make money you don't survive. That is the ultimate check and balance built into the private sector. Because of the public policy, this may allow a crown corporation to run at a loss, in some cases a perennial loss. The lack of good management in a crown corporation can sometimes get hidden in the cost of public policy. There is no reason for that.
I'm looking for a methodology to ensure that the management of the crown corporation is accountable in some way. As I said, the private sector is accountable to the marketplace. Crown corporations have the marketplace removed from them. There must be some methodology to ensure that accountability.
This is where I think that apart from the estimates and the annual examination by standing committees, there should be a committee of the House that has developed expertise to examine the management of crown corporations in the same way as I was talking about a periodic review of the statutory programs. As I said before, an annual in-depth review of statutory programs is not in any way or shape desirable. I'm not even sure an annual review of all crown corporations is absolutely necessary. But a periodic examination of the quality of management and the way they can deliver the business side of the crown corporation to ensure that it's being done as well as possible, even though the profit may be masked by the public policy mandate - that's what I'm trying to achieve, Madam Chair.
The Chair: Our researcher has heard the discussion and he's heard it in the context of a previous discussion about the mandate of the estimates committee. May I suggest that we give him the opportunity to work on some wording that he thinks might satisfy the subcommittee?
One thing you might want to consider, Brian, is that we might want to pick a number of areas, and this could be one. Whether or not an estimates committee is established, this is an area that needs to be looked into by Parliament and by some committee of Parliament if it's not going to be a new estimates committee. There are a number of areas in which, in another section, we might want to express our concern about a fairly urgent need for Parliament to address these issues. I'm thinking of government-wide spending and that kind of thing.
Mr. Pagtakhan: On that point, I agree with the goal. You said it - not to deal with the estimates. So immediately it cannot fall under the proposed estimates committee, if the estimates in fact are not its function with this particular group of agencies.
The Chair: It is estimates, though. They don't table part IIIs, but they're still part of the part IIs of the departments.
Mr. Pagtakhan: But if it will not review the estimates, but it will review the mandate, it may belong to the people who have the very expertise to know about that mandate.
.1140
There is something in what John is saying that applies when you say you disagree in terms of getting a committee just for this. That's why I raised it as a possibility, because I believe in what you're proposing - unless the new committee will be such that it will be an estimate in a name appropriate to encompass this particular kind of activity as a focused one, so that it is not a misnomer to have a new committee called ``estimates committee'' and one of its functions is not to examine the estimates. It will be a misnomer, okay. But if we believe in this function to be done by this emerging new committee we have to name the committee. So mine is only a terminology.
A more fundamental question to me is that something indeed be done by this emerging committee. It should be something as an activity to be monitored on a very gross level - having received the reports, I can see that - as part of a coordinating, scrutinizing role, and then report to the House saying this particular crown corporation must now be examined by a special committee of the House.
My difficulty with that as an ultimate proposal is that it takes time for the House to reply to that, or for the government, and we may lose time. But if time is not so much of an essence in that, that's one approach. If you can reconcile those kinds of things....
I like the proposal. It's a misnomer as it now stands in our committee. It can be incorporated if we all agree.
The Chair: Let me just suggest that all the work we've done now for over a year and a half is going to be wasted if we don't get this report done before an election is called.
Mr. Williams: When is that, Madam Chair?
The Chair: If I knew that I would perhaps be in less of a panic, John.
That would be very frustrating to all of us. Anyway, we'll leave that to Mr. O'Neal to see what he can come back with.
We have about 15 minutes left. Before we break up I'd like to agree on when our next meetings are going to be. I really do want to get this finished, and I'm sure the rest of you do too. Then we can come back and get through perhaps one or two more recommendations.
Monsieur Laurin, can we deal with the next meeting first?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: That's okay.
[English]
The Chair: Okay. Do we want to continue trying to meet Tuesday and Thursday mornings, short if the procedure and House affairs committee is meeting until noon or if they are not meeting? Is there any interest in establishing perhaps one full day when we would finish this thing?
Mr. Williams: Madam Chair, I didn't quite hear.
The Chair: My question is do we want to keep meeting Tuesday and Thursday mornings? What we've been doing is meeting for the full morning when the procedure and House affairs committee isn't meeting, or meeting just until eleven when they are meeting. We've now established that except for today and things like the estimates we have priority for Room 112-N, so we don't have to run between buildings. Is there any interest in setting a full day's meeting at some point to try to complete this? I know how difficult that is with everybody's schedule.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Firstly, Madam Chair, a full half day, a misnomer, I think will be already a great improvement, but only when we have come to the point that we are really looking at the final draft once and for all so that there is continuity of thinking at that point. Otherwise it is not.
Secondly, if we know in advance that the mother committee is not meeting that particular Tuesday or Thursday, I think 9:30 to 12 noon may still be too long. Maybe 10 to 12 would be okay, instead of 9:30 to 11.
The Chair: The difficulty is knowing. Right now its meetings are scheduled from 11 o'clock both Tuesday and Thursday mornings. In the last three weeks it hasn't met in both of those time slots.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay, then in that case we just say 9:30 and then up to 11:30 perhaps.
The Chair: Okay.
I could attempt to talk to the chair of the procedure and House affairs committee and see if he is prepared to agree that the committee will meet on Tuesday but not on Thursday to allow the subcommittee to finish its business.
.1145
Mr. Pagtakhan: Yes.
The Chair: That's a possibility.
Mr. Pagtakhan: To me, a two-hour meeting is getting a little....
The Chair: Okay. I'll leave it this way. We'll continue as we are unless I can work out some arrangement with the chair of the procedure and House affairs committee. If we've got a long morning, we'll go from 9:30 till 11:30.
Mr. Williams: If we feel that we do want to expedite the final report, Madam Chair, I don't know about the others, but perhaps from noon to four o'clock on a Friday might be a possibility, because Friday is a fairly quiet day potentially.
The Chair: In the interests of getting this done, I am prepared to give up my regular afternoons and my Friday afternoon in my constituency.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I go back to my riding on Fridays.
The Chairman: So do I, usually.
Mr. Laurin: On Fridays, I'm in the House as deputy whip and as a rule I have to be there until 2:30 p.m. We share the duty. Madam Chair, you yourself are a deputy whip. On Fridays, my whip is often absent and I have to replace him. After that I have to go back to my riding.
Personally, given the progress of our work and what's at stake here, I don't think it's urgent to have a report published about this within a month. I don't think we are prepared to do that or that we will manage to do that. There will be an election even if our report is not tabled before May. There will still be committees and I'm not sure that our report would apply as soon as the House resumes after the next election. This is a very long term study project.
The Chairman: We have an order from the House.
Mr. Laurin: The government will do the same thing it did in the Somalia affair. It will put an end to our mandate.
[English]
Mr. Williams: I have a question, Madam Chair.
The Chair: I would be embarrassed to go back and ask for another extension.
Mr. Williams: When we table this report with the procedure and House affairs committee, would you anticipate that they would need a significant amount of time to look it through?
The Chair: I would hope not. I mean, I would rely on each of you and I would rely on Rey and myself and our other members to persuade our colleagues that we've done the best we can. If they want to start quibbling about the details, they would need to devote another year to it. We would recommend very strongly that they not do that. I think we would discuss it with our colleagues and I hope you would do the same. So hopefully they might spend one meeting on it, no more than two.
Mr. Williams: Yes.
Mr. Pagtakhan: The precedent is that committee chairs of other committees do table the report on behalf of the subcommittee, because it's easier. Hopefully that will be....
Mr. Williams: Then, Madam Chair, I think you've received some foggy direction from the members. Perhaps we should continue.
The Chair: Okay. Friday is not a good day to do that. If it came to the point where that kind of longer meeting seemed like a good idea, what about Monday, perhaps even going into the evening? Is that a possibility? No?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Tuesday, but not Monday or Friday, Madam Chair. Not for me, in any event. I can agree that the committee can sit in my absence if you feel there is an emergency.
The Chairman: Thursday evening, perhaps?
Mr. Laurin: Yes, if the need arises.
The Chairman: Or else Thursday or part of Friday?
Mr. Laurin: No, I'm here until Friday.
The Chairman: Perhaps Thursday evening. All right.
[English]
And for you, John?
Mr. Williams: Perhaps I can make an exception.
The Chair: Yes. I would try to make it one meeting where we're really finishing it up.
Mr. Williams: I don't know if we could maybe even start at one o'clock and go through question period as well.
The Chair: It's possible.
.1150
Mr. Williams: I have a couple of meetings each afternoon that perhaps I can beg out of for one day, and maybe even go through into the evening.
The Chair: Okay.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Two question periods will be impossible for me because of my other duty. I have to be out by 1:30.
Friday is a possibility if we can all agree on one particular Friday when there is no contentious -
The Chair: No, Monsieur Laurin is not available Fridays.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Why don't we leave it to the chair to arrange that kind of thing?
The Chair: Okay. I'm going to operate on the assumption -
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Madam Chair, what's preventing us from continuing on Tuesdays and Thursdays?
The Chairman: Nothing, except the regularly scheduled meetings of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. I think we're all members of that committee.
Mr. Laurin: If you want to have a full day, yes.
The Chairman: For a full day, we will try to find other members.
[English]
What I would like to try to do is set up a schedule that would get us through this report in the three weeks after Parliament comes back. It may or may not work, but if we try that we have a better chance of completing than if we don't try that. I'll do the best to make sure we set up a schedule of meetings well before you're back so you'll know when they're going to be. Is that okay?
Mr. Laurin: That's a big order.
The Chair: Do we want to start another recommendation now for the next ten minutes, or do we want to adjourn now?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I agree that we should return, Madam Chair.
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: I'd just like to look at where we are. Aside from all these things from you that are still not the major ones.... We have identified reallocation as a major recommendation. What other major recommendations -
The Chair: It's in here. We're still coming to it.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Okay. Have we heard all those major ones we have to focus on the next time? Are there one or two I don't know of? Reallocation is one.
The Chair: Do you want to give us an idea of what's ahead for us?
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: Yes, working under the hypothesis of the exercise suggested by the Chair. Let me point out that I was asked to suspend my opinions...
The Chairman: Nothing has been decided yet.
Mr. Laurin: ... on the existence or non-existence of this committee. I agree to go through this exercise honestly with you. I think we're discussing the kind of car we should have, whereas I would like us to be discussing the role I will play in the car. Will I be pilot or copilot?
The Chair: Exactly, but we could discuss the hypothesis of buying a car.
Mr. Laurin: Yes, that's right.
The Chair: What are the criteria?
[English]
Mr. Pagtakhan: Madam Chair, would you like to take another ten minutes? I'll be okay.
The Chair: I think Monsieur Laurin has suggested adjournment. I don't mind pressing on if you wish, though. Perhaps Mr. O'Neal could just indicate what's coming up.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: If you think that we can really make some progress at the last minute, I will be pleased to sit longer, but starting another subject... There are only seven minutes left.
[English]
The Chair: So we can all get our minds in the right frame of mind for when we return, perhaps Mr. O'Neal could indicate the major chunks of recommendations and the major issues we might have to deal with.
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: I would like to add a comment following Mr. White's suggestion. We started talking about our work in the coming days, but according to Mr. White's suggestion, the estimates committee could deal with the business plans of Crown corporations and see to it that these plans are respected. I would like the researcher to take into account the fact that it seems to me that the Auditor General does that work very well already. With his whole team and all the resources at his disposal, the Auditor General does not manage to examine all Crown corporations every year. I think he does so approximately every five years. Would that work really be done better by a committee? I strongly doubt it.
When things are going well in a Crown corporation we don't hear about it and I think that's normal. When things start to go less well, it is pointed out by the Auditor General, and at that point, the role of the committee is to examine the situation. Unfortunately, we always have to act retroactively and make sure that these things are avoided in the future. I don't want the committee to become a substitute for the Auditor General.
.1155
[English]
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chairman, I'll take into account the concerns Monsieur Laurin has just expressed.
As we indicated earlier, parts of this will be rewritten, and as I rewrite them I will take those concerns into account. As I understand it, what the Auditor General does now is he verifies the accounts of the crown corporations on a retrospective basis. He looks back at those accounts and he signifies that they're in order. I will check on this, Mr. Williams, to make sure that this is correct.
I believe what the subcommittee is talking about here is more a prospective look into the future in terms of what an estimates committee might do in terms of crown corporations.
The Chair: Perhaps I could just make one point about that, because my understanding is that most of the crown corporations use the Auditor General as their auditor, but they are not required to.
Mr. Williams: The majority of crown corporations, if not all of them, do not use the Auditor General as their auditor. The Auditor General has quite a limited role, but I can't quite specifically say what it is regarding crown corporations.
The Chair: Our concern here really isn't the job of the public accounts committee. They're doing that quite well. Our job is having more influence over the money they get and deciding how they can spend it.
Mr. Williams: ``Prospective'', as Brian said.
The Chair: ``Prospective'', as opposed to ``retrospective''.
Mr. Williams: Absolutely.
Mr. Pagtakhan: The objective of keeping a standing committee is a big challenge, Brian.
Mr. O'Neal: They're all big challenges.
The Chair: Any final comments?
Mr. O'Neal: I just wanted to point out first that in the sections the subcommittee has before it there is a section that deals with the costs associated with creating a new committee, because later on you make a suggestion that standing committees ought to take costs into account when they're making policy proposals. So this is to show leadership through example in this case.
Secondly, there are a couple of more recommendations that deal with committee membership and try to enhance stability in committee membership, which I suspect are fairly non-controversial.
The recommendation immediately after that has to do with the reallocation of funds. Over the next week I am going to make a number of suggested changes to that recommendation in line with what the Clerk of the House told the subcommittee last week.
Mr. Pagtakhan: I have one last point, Madam Chair. We have used the word ``estimates'', and it took me a while to fully grasp the meaning of that. We relay to the general public. The word ``appropriation'' is more descriptive of what we do. If we agree to that, is it now not the time to change the name? I'm raising that as an issue.
The Chair: Possibly.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Even this whole business of supply....
[Translation]
Mr. Laurin: The French word ``réaffectation'' is appropriate.
[English]
Mr. Williams: I really don't want to get into the philosophical thing of change in the estimates that has been around for many, many years, if not hundreds of years. But I would ask that you think about having as a first order of business at the next meeting a decision on whether or not we are going to make a recommendation about the creation of a new committee. A significant part of the report is written on the basis that we are making that recommendation. Therefore Brian is going to need some time if we decide against that recommendation.
The Chair: Rewriting the report.
Mr. Williams: There will be a significant rewrite available. I'm still ambivalent regarding the committee, because I still don't have it clear in my mind how the other members of this committee see the division of responsibilities. Even in my own mind I don't have a clear division of responsibilities between other standing committees and this one that we envisage.
The Chair: John, that is exactly why in your absence we decided to suspend the decision and look at how we could structure it if we did it. Hopefully that might answer some of the questions you're raising for all of us.
.1200
Mr. Williams: Let's make that decision definitively at the next meeting. We are either going to make that recommendation or we are not going to make that recommendation. If we change that recommendation, then Brian is going to have a serious rewrite on his hands.
Mr. O'Neal: Perhaps I may just add to that, Madam Chair. I think Monsieur Laurin and in part Dr. Pagtakhan were both suggesting that it might be a good idea to have at least the table in front of you that would lay out the mandates of the various committees. This would include the proposed mandate for the estimates committee so you could compare them across the table. I will have that for your next meeting.
Mr. Williams: If you can prepare something along that line so we can come to a clear common understanding of the divisional responsibilities, then we will be able to make a definitive decision collectively on where we want to go.
Mr. Pagtakhan: Exactly.
The Chair: In part, it may depend on the rewrite Brian is doing of what such a committee would do and its relationship to the standing committees. Once we see that we may be in the position to create a new one.
Thank you very much.
This meeting is adjourned.