OGGO Committee Report

The central focus of this report has been on practical changes that can be made, both by committees and by the Government, to enhance the role of Parliament and its committees in the scrutiny of government spending, in holding Government accountable, and in influencing future directions. Actions by both Parliament and the Government continue to be needed, in the specific respects recommended above. In the view of the Subcommittee, action by each will provide critically important support for the action that is needed from the other.

The reinforcement works both ways. Officials from Treasury Board Secretariat and other departments have made it abundantly clear that feedback from Parliament about the estimates and related reports is now the key to further progress — to further steps in improving the information provided to Parliament. And equally, from the perspective of parliamentarians, information reformulated along the lines recommended in this report can make a vital contribution to placing Parliament in a position where better feedback to government can be provided, more consistently, by committees.

Mutual reinforcement, by government and Parliament, is also important in the creation of stronger incentives for work on estimates by Parliament, and for responsiveness to this work by governments. This is because the formal capacity of Parliament to reduce the spending authorities of the Government based on Votes reported by committees is no longer the central basis for parliamentary influence on government spending (under conditions of majority government, at least). As affirmed in earlier parliamentary reports on the estimates process, the modern work of Parliament centres on holding governments accountable for what they do, including results achieved through the expenditures previously authorized by Parliament, and future priorities and plans. Work on estimates is thus part of a year-round process, requiring continuous attention to programs and their impacts.¹² Within this process, governments can provide important incentives to Parliament by ensuring that required information is provided in a timely way, and communicating clear evidence of responsiveness to parliamentary recommendations relating to programs and spending when these are made. Equally, when committees invest the time to develop recommendations that reflect a strong understanding of the full complexity of programs and are accompanied by persuasive rationales, governments are given a heightened incentive to reflect them in future plans. Members of the Subcommittee believe that incentives for both parliamentarians and governments to strengthen their contribution to democratic accountability can be constructed, step by step, through practical efforts such as those called for in this report

The reasons for continuing the collaboration thus go beyond the estimates process itself, to the need to make government more efficient and effective, more responsive to the needs of Canadians, and more legitimate in their eyes. This is a challenge for our times, and for us all. And it is as a contribution to meeting this challenge that members of the Subcommittee on the Estimates Process of the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates submit this report.