In response to a question during the hearing, Global Affairs Canada provided the following information.

Information Provided by Global Affairs Canada to the Office of the Auditor General

The Office of the Auditor General’s (OAG) team submitted a request for project documentation to Global Affairs Canada’s (GAC) to be provided within five business days. The GAC Office of the Chief Audit Executive immediately took action upon receiving the request and advised the OAG team that it would take more than the requested five business days to provide project documentation due to the wide-ranging nature of the documents. Overall, 459 project specific documents, in addition to approximately 300 documents related to GAC’s policies and program management, were provided to the OAG.

The specific document request involved projects managed by over 50 different projects officers located all around the world. The mobility of GAC’s international assistance workforce, in part due to the rotational human resource system, in addition to the challenges for project officers, especially those working in the field who have no or limited access to corporate information management systems, also contributed to delays in sharing documents. In addition, early in the process, GAC should have clarified with the OAG which documents were required to consider the file completed. This would have narrowed the search for missing documents. It is for these reasons that the Department has committed to redoubling our efforts to ensure that we have the effective information management and outcome measurement systems in place to demonstrate to Canadians the value of our investments. Moreover, GAC’s Office of the Chief Audit Executive is currently developing a protocol, which will include the process for managing information requests, to better support future OAG audits.