[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]
Thursday, December 14, 1995
.0941 
[English]
The Chair: I call to order this meeting of the Sub-Committee on the Business of Supply.
We've now made two reports to Parliament and not yet gotten to our main topic. I would try to perhaps get us back on track. I think we agreed today that we would look at the list of issues to see if we were satisfied with that or wanted to add anything to it. It doesn't mean it's cast in stone. As issues come forward we can certainly change it. But I thought it would be helpful, given the discussion we've had, if we reviewed that and accepted that for the moment these are the issues we in fact want to address.
The other thing I'd like to raise with the committee is whether a questionnaire to members of Parliament would be helpful.
The third thing I'd like to resolve is future witnesses, if any, and what are the gaps so far in the information we've heard. One of the things I'd like to suggest for discussion is whether it would be helpful, very early after we return, to have a round table with chairs of committees - not necessarily all of them, obviously, but at least those who are interested.
My thinking is that the more we discuss this, the more it becomes evident that the approach of parliamentarians and the attitude of parliamentarians to the estimates is a major hurdle, and that part of what we would be trying to do, in at least some of our recommendations, is to give the estimates more relevance so that parliamentarians are willing and informed enough to have some significant influence. It did seem to me that the discussion with committee chairs on how they have handled the estimates, why they handle them the way they do, why they don't spend more time on them and what would improve that would be extremely helpful to us.
That being said, has anybody had a chance to read through the draft our researcher put out at the end of November, or shall we just take a few moments now to go through them paragraph by paragraph to see if there are any corrections? Does anybody have anything they'd like to see changed?
Mr. Williams (St. Albert): I had overlooked, Madam Chairman, this particular small paper prepared by the library to define the issues. I'd actually prepared my own little list. I'd just like a couple of minutes to make a comparison, if I may.
The Chair: Sure.
.0945
Mr. Williams: One issue, Madam Chairman, that I don't see in the library's synopsis is a review of the relevant Standing Orders that apply to the supply days.
The Chair: Okay.
I am just looking at my own notes to see what I also have highlighted as issues.
Maybe I can ask you, Brian. One thing that I think is lacking in the current process is the ability to look at things that happen across departments; as an example, the management of vehicles. That would be just one example of things that stretch across departments.
Mr. Brian O'Neal (Committee Researcher): Yes. It's also often the case that some programs are jointly conducted by several departments at once. So that's another issue that would be included.
The Chair: There may also be programs that are granted money from different departments. I'm not sure Mr. Williams's waste report has caught up with that yet.
Mr. Williams: Oh, oh. I'm working on it, Madam Chairman. Thank you for the tip. I'll get it in the next one.
Mr. O'Neal: If I might suggest, that might be an issue that could be considered under the heading of ``a restructured committee system''. It has been suggested that there be a single committee to receive and review the estimates. That single committee might be capable of conducting a cross-departmental review of the type you've indicated.
Mr. Williams: These cross-departmental issues are, I hope - and I do underline ``I hope'' - largely covered off by Treasury Board policies. It certainly would be incumbent upon somebody to check, on an ongoing basis, the fact that these policies exist and how relevant they are.
When you mention motor vehicles, it's interesting to note that Treasury Board reimburses civil servants and members of Parliament at a much higher rate than the Department of Finance is prepared to reimburse employees of the private sector, albeit an announcement came out of Finance last week that they have increased the reimbursement cost allowable by businesses to their employees. It's still significantly short of what Treasury Board estimates is allowable for civil servants and MPs.
Both say their figures are based on an analysis of the real costs. It seems rather strange to me that the private sector gets it in the ear and the public service gets the benefit.
That's by way of an example, Madam Chairman. I had to get that on the record.
Mr. Arseneault (Restigouche - Chaleur): Are you making a statement in the House today?
Mr. Williams: Oh, oh. No.
The Chair: He's just rehearsing.
.0950
That would be an example of something that's across all departments. Electronic deposit is another one. Information technology is another. It's there across all departments.
Can a standing committee get to the nub of that in its review of the estimates or does there need to be another mechanism?
Mr. Williams: As we have tossed around, there's the potential of a single committee to examine the estimates on an ongoing basis or whatever. It would have the possibility of addressing that situation. But is it the best way to go? That's what we have to discuss.
Mr. Arseneault: I think you know my feeling on that. I would lean more toward a central or a permanent committee.
Mr. Williams: With research capabilities.
Mr. Arseneault: That's one of the problems even with standing committees. We have very good research at the head table - I'm not knocking that - but they're not working for the individual member in the sense that the individual member feels as though they can't ask them to do this or that. Not only that, but they should be right behind them or next to them, and as a minister answers a question or something they should be able to turn and ask the researcher what they think of this or that question. There should be advisers right there, or consultants, almost, feeding you information, working for the members directly.
We get very good research documentation now from our committee researchers, but - general questions. They have to be almost neutral-type questions rather than political questions, because they have to be careful as well. They're working for the government, basically, to a certain extent, but they have to be neutral in their work. You start embarrassing the government too often, you know what happens - or what could happen.
Mr. Williams: Yes, look at yesterday.
Mr. Arseneault: What happened yesterday? Did something happen in your caucus yesterday?
Mr. Williams: No, we embarrassed the Prime Minister.
Mr. Arseneault: I'm thinking your leaders embarrassed themselves.
The Chair: I think it's open to debate as to who embarrassed whom.
Mr. Arseneault: I think you should recall your leader. You have a policy of recall; I think now's the time. It's mid-term. Get an evaluation done.
Mr. Williams: Oh, oh!
The Chair: I'm just flipping quickly through my notes. The other issue is that of contingency reserves, for instance. These are just examples of things that cut across departments.
Mr. Arseneault: We could have a permanent committee for supplementary estimates.
Mr. Williams: It's interesting to note that when I tried to debate the supplementary estimates in the House the day before yesterday - another $2.5 billion of spending, of course - the Standing Orders don't allow debate. It just goes through the House as a formal -
The Chair: I will put on the record the fact that the Standing Orders allow five days of debate on supplementary estimates. If the opposition parties choose not to use those days for that purpose, that's their problem.
That is an issue I would like to address, in fact - the allotted days for debate on supply.
Mr. Arseneault: Yes, that has to be addressed.
Mr. Williams: These supply days have moved a long way from the concept of debating supply.
Mr. Arseneault: Yes.
The Chair: Yes. There are options we might want to consider. Should there be certain days that might be used only to debate supply?
Mr. Williams: Yes. Because at this point in time, if these twenty allotted days are used elsewhere, that only leaves that one day in June for supply. We must also remember the concept of grievance prior to debating supply -
The Chair: Which is the purpose of supply days.
Mr. Williams: But that leaves no room for supply itself.
The Chair: It sounds to me that the opposition is in the position of the gentleman before the courts who complained that he killed his parents and now he's an orphan, so they should have mercy on him.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
Mr. Arseneault: That's pretty good. I must remember that one.
Mr. O'Neal: In conjunction with the use of supply days I believe there was an experiment a number of years ago during which the reports of standing committees on the estimates were debated in the House, and the opposition chose which reports were to be debated. If the committee wishes, I can take a look in greater detail at that experiment and see why it wasn't continued. Personally, I found it an interesting idea.
The Chair: There's nothing to prevent it - but I'd appreciate knowing how that worked out.
Mr. Arseneault: Yes, that's a good idea.
.0955
The Chair: One other issue I'm interested in is whether Parliament has sufficient information about previous years' spending in comparisons of this year's with previous years; comparisons of actual spending with planned spending.
Mr. Williams: When we had the Treasury Board officials before the committee, Madam Chairman, I thought it would be appropriate to combine the output documents with the current estimates, provided the current estimates weren't diffused through an output document. The output document and the estimates would have to be presented in one document, albeit it was obvious which was which.
Treasury Board officials are also telling us they're talking about a performance document in the fall, and according to the pro forma they provided to us it's intended to show the estimates for the year, the actual spending for the year. After some time, of course, there would be historical information, going back two or three years. So we would have the estimates, actual spending, and the historical spending for the last two or three years. With the estimates document tabled in the springtime, we would have the estimates with the output documents, which would be the potential spending for the next two or three years.
As I say, the further out you go, the more global and speculative become the numbers. Nonetheless, it would bring the whole concept into two documents, from the outlook, getting more precise, to the estimates, and then the performance documents, which would start with the estimates, actual spending, and historical spending over some number of years. So we would have maybe a five- or six-year horizon - three or four on either side - with the estimate and actual spending right through the middle. The two documents work together to provide a complete picture of future and past in order to debate the present.
Mr. Arseneault: Madam Chair, some of this has to do with the responsibility of the individual member as well, to be prepared for the estimates and to do some of their own research. We talk about having research staff, but it's important for the member to be organized and to do some research and understand what the estimates are all about.
For instance, I remember the estimates seemed to be more important to me when I was in opposition than they are now. At that time we approached the estimates with the idea of trying to dig further and see what went on in the last couple of years. We'd show up in committee with the estimates books for that department going back two or three years, and then today's estimates. You would prepare your questions ahead of time. You'd have your things highlighted. You'd go back two or three years. But what I found in doing that is that there was no consistency in terminology from one year to the other. There was no guarantee - The formats would change. It would be very difficult to follow the line; very difficult. There has to be more consistency than in the documentation from year to year.
I know we're running a pilot project with some departments this year. Again, that's going to create problems for the MP who dealt with those departments in and out of forum last year or this year. But how often does this happen? There has to be terminology consistency and there has to be some type of consistency in the packages presented to the members of Parliament so they can follow up and it's readable.
The Chair: So they can make a comparison.
Mr. Arseneault: The specialists, such as Brian here, can go into any document and understand it much easier than we can. We're not necessarily specialists in those types of research materials.
Mr. O'Neal: Just for the committee's information, you might find it interesting that in my search for witnesses to appear before this subcommittee I did speak to the C.D. Howe Institute, which respectfully declined the possibility of appearing here, but they did wish to pass on the information that their senior economic analyst there finds the part IIIs are totally incomprehensible.
So with all due respect to you, Mr. Arseneault, I'm afraid I have problems with the part IIIs of the estimates as well.
.1000
Mr. Arseneault: Maybe a full-time committee would have the time to get a feel for that. You have to be into that on a regular basis. I remember when I did the estimates in opposition, and quite honestly we kept the minister there and made a motion to have the minister come back. We went over and over them. All of a sudden, you get a feel for it. You're into it.
The minister would say something and we'd say, well, no, that's not right. On page so-and-so you're saying this and now you're saying that. Explain the difference. But they always had an explanation such as, well, we tabled some supplementary estimates. The terminology was always different, especially with personnel, years of work, and how many personnel were here or there.
So I think a permanent committee with some consistency in the make-up of its membership would add to the proper study of estimates after a while. They could probably make the proper recommendations in the type of presentations that had to be made.
The Chair: I'm not sure we're ready to come to conclusions yet, but I'm almost saying that I think it's really important for the standing committees to maintain a role and connect the estimates with policies and priorities of government. There may be room as well for an overview committee that can deal with things that don't fall specifically within departments.
Mr. Williams: I'd just like to add to what Mr. Arseneault has been saying eloquently and right on the button. We do need this information, which is why I said if we have the outlooks and the estimates together in one document that will cover several years into the future, along with the performance document, which gives us the estimates going backwards, in two documents we should have this six- to eight-year picture.
Certainly a lot of the rummaging through books to try to cross-reference and obtain information when the same information is presented in different formats makes our job a lot more difficult. As long as we keep the emphasis on a high standard of presentation with some guidelines by the Treasury Board, as we've already instructed them to do, hopefully we will find that we have made significant progress in that area.
I'm hopeful that two or three years from now when we do have this whole process presented in this format, we will find that the level of being able to obtain information from these documents will be significantly enhanced. That's my hope and desire, Madam Chair.
Mr. Arseneault: The other thing that I hope we don't forget is the crown corporations. I think that's a must.
An example was the announcement yesterday by the CBC that they're cutting back and eliminating Radio Canada International. It costs them $16 million for the studio they have in New York. One person has a key for it and it costs $16 million just so that at any time something Canadian is going on in New York and someone has to tape something, a guy can go in there and open the door and they can go into this studio, which is a Canadian studio. It costs $16 million to outfit that. Then they turn around and eliminate Radio Canada International because it's costing $16 million to operate.
The Chair: The crown corps are here under section B.
Mr. Arseneault: But that has to be looked at in relationship to this permanent committee.
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Arseneault: Maybe the solution, Madam Chair, is not necessarily the permanent committee looking at every department. Maybe it's more along the lines of a pilot project of six departments. I believe the estimates now allow for a certain number of the estimates to be debated in the House. Not all, but so many can be referred to the House or something.
The Chair: Yes, it's the reports of committees on the estimates. Brian has just indicated that he's going to look back on that. It is allowed and there was a particular experiment on that some time ago, so he's going to look back and see why that was discontinued.
Mr. Arseneault: Right. Maybe every year so many departmental estimates could be referred to this parliamentary committee, but not all of them. The legislative committees could still do the estimates except for so many a year that would go to this one.
Mr. O'Neal: With respect to oversight of the crown corporations, I believe there was a recommendation in the Huntington-Lachance report that a separate committee be established to give crown corporations and other agencies more thorough oversight. So that's a recommendation, in a sense, the committee has and could consider.
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Mr. Williams: I would like to explore the idea that crown corporations - Mr. Arseneault is perfectly correct - cannot be totally removed from scrutiny by Parliament. I see three categories of spending: the estimates, statutory spending and crown corporations. I feel that some mechanisms should be in place to ensure annual scrutiny of the estimates.
I don't want to get into, ``Well, we're going to take one or two departments this year and leave the rest for another year.'' Estimates are annual spending. They have to be approved by Parliament. Therefore, the opportunity to cover all, if so desired, has to be there.
As far as the statutory programs and crown corporations are concerned, I'd like to discuss the concept of program evaluation and cyclical evaluations. While I think the estimates have to be examined every year, I think it's totally inappropriate to examine every crown corporation's statutory spending every year, because they're far too big, detailed and complex. If are going to try to get our minds around it every year, it will become a superficial exercise in futility. But if it's done on a cyclical basis, or on a basis of once every five to ten years, I think it gives us the opportunity to focus right in and take some meaningful conclusions.
Another thing I'd like the committee to consider is the possibility, as Mr. Arseneault said, of a specific standing committee, or perhaps we may want to think about the House shutting down for a week and to have all committees focus on the estimates. That's a potential alternative.
The other thing I'd like us to consider is that right now the Standing Orders say that committees are deemed to have reported by May 31, whether or not they actually have done so. We're very much concerned about the lack of involvement by committees. I feel the lack of involvement is because of the lack of ability to change. We may want to look at the concept of requiring the government to respond to a report tabled by a committee, just as the Standing Orders call for a government report from any standing order. Right now they're just tabled and that's it for supply, but we may want to take a look at the concept of requiring the government to respond, especially if the committee were to make some comments on that with documents, which is your preference, Madam Chair.
The Chair: I suggest that at this point - we've had a pretty thorough discussion twice now - everybody take this and if you have things you want to add to it or change, please do so by scribbling some notes in the margin and sending it back to Brian or calling him on the phone and doing it that way.
The second thing I wanted to mention is that he has started putting together what's almost an outline of a report, in blocks of issues we might want to talk about. He would like to circulate that to committee members and get some feedback from you as early as possible in the new year so that any changes can be made.
Did you want to discuss that now or simply circulate it?
Mr. O'Neal: I can discuss it briefly. It's called an issues and options document. It breaks down what the committee has been discussing into what has been referred to earlier as ``chewable chunks''. So I have rather large categories - accountability, influence, and confidence, which has been a fairly important issue for the committee. Then I have a paragraph that explains each of these larger issues succinctly. Then I lay out the options as they've been presented by the witnesses. Some of these options are contradictory to one another, so there's a bit of a debate.
The document also provides a summary of what was said by witnesses, so there's no necessity for you to spend hours going back through your transcripts to see what was said. Hopefully it will also help you focus on what you might want to do as a report and what sorts of recommendations you may wish to make.
.1010
As the chair has indicated, I've been working on this for the last couple of weeks, but my time has been limited. I hope over the Christmas break I'll have more time to devote to this. With any luck at all it should be ready by mid-January and I should be able to send it off to you at your constituency offices so you'll have a chance to review it and then, if you like, get back in touch with me with any suggestions or questions you might have.
As the chair has indicated, a document of this sort, if it works properly, should be able to serve as the foundation for an eventual report for you.
Mr. Williams: I have one suggestion, Brian. Can you break that report into several subjects that may be applicable in one area, put them together, and so on? We may want to take the areas we have discussed and break them down: at this particular meeting we will discuss this subject and the areas around it -
The Chair: Exactly what I'm trying to get to.
Mr. Williams: - so we will try to bring some focus to the committee as we move towards conclusions. That would also be helpful and appropriate with your mid-January report, Brian.
The Chair: Would the committee also find it helpful to have a table format that lists the witnesses and, under the types of issues we're interested in, the comments or recommendations of those witnesses? That's a little more detailed than what would go into this, which is the beginning of an outline of a report.
Mr. Arseneault: I think it would be helpful.
The Chair: I have found that helpful. That's done more often in legislative committees, but if we're looking at accountability, if we're looking at information as one chunk of our work, it's helpful to know what the different witnesses have said on that issue and to be able to compare easily.
Is that a possible workload?
Mr. O'Neal: I can do that, certainly.
Mr. Williams: Thank you, Brian.
The Chair: Thank you.
Now, talking about cutting down the workload of members of Parliament and making information manageable, may I go back for a moment to the idea of a questionnaire for members of Parliament.
My feeling is that if somehow we don't get to the nub of how members would like to be able to exercise their responsibility better, why they don't, what it would take for them to take a more active role, we may be working in the dark. We may produce another one of those reports of which everybody says, yes, fine ideas; and then nothing ever happens. It seems to me it might be helpful to use this as a tool to let members of Parliament know what this subcommittee is doing and to seek their input and hopefully to raise their own awareness, before they're faced with the estimates this year, of how important their role is. It was also my thinking that this would be another useful purpose served by our having a round table with however many committee chairs are interested.
The Clerk of the Committee: Maybe that should be a question on the questionnaire.
The Chair: It could be.
You had received a draft of a possible questionnaire. It was just my first thoughts. It was sent out to you by the clerk on December 7. Can we take a few minutes to look at it now?.
Mr. Arseneault: Madam Chair, my thoughts on it from the outset - and I mentioned that before this was drafted - were that we would get a quicker response if the members could check off a lot of this stuff. ``Did your committee spend time on reviewing departmental estimates in 1994 and 1995?'' We could very easily ask that question and have them answer yes or no and have them check it off. When a lot of members see this, they're going to think it's going to take a fair amount of time to respond. They may put it in a pile and say, okay, I'll do that when I have time. But if you look at a check system - all of a sudden you start doing it - and then you sneak in your comments later, or whatever.
The Chair: Excellent.
Mr. Arseneault: They can put the comments in at the end, so you get them into it and then you get them to start commenting. But I think a check-off list would be more appropriate.
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Mr. Williams: Building on what Mr. Arseneault has said, Madam Chairman - I would like to see more detail on the potential options we have laid on the table. If you asked 295 parliamentarians where they want to go, you would get 295 answers. But if you were to ask them whether they would prefer, for example, that the House close for a week and just focus on the estimates, or they would prefer a single standing committee, or they would prefer that they be required to table a report, if you we were to give them some options and ask which one they would prefer, I think you would get more meaningful results than just asking where they want to go.
Mr. Arseneault: You say ``What changes would be needed for your committee to give more importance to examining the estimates?'' Well, that's a broad question. Not sitting on the committee here and listening to the information, the MP may not know what direction we're speaking of, or may have another idea altogether.
If you listed all the options there, they'd check off a couple or list them in priority, one, two, three, four, five - and then you put ``other'', if they have other things to make it more interesting.
The questions are good. They're on the areas we want answers to.
The Chair: Let me leave that for a moment, Guy. As a sociologist by training, I know you get different answers if you suggest answers to people from those you get if you leave it to them to give you their answers. I don't want to create bias, especially since I'm not sure we have been through all the possible options we might list.
But on the third one, let me pick up on your idea. I think we have heard enough about what prevents members of Parliament from spending some time that we could list - ``What do you think explains the lack of interest?'' Lack of time is a good example.
Mr. Williams: Lack of proper information.
The Chair: Information; lack of clarity in the information.
Mr. Williams: An impression that whatever they say has no benefit.
The Chair: That's a third one. No results from the exercise, something like that.
Mr. Williams: Too superficial to get right into the meat of the situation.
The Chair: Two options, though: too superficial, too detailed. I've heard both complaints from people.
Mr. Arseneault: Another thing is that if you're not in opposition, you tend not to spend as much time on the estimates, I find. I've been sitting on committee since I've been in government, and I haven't spent as much time -
The Chair: It's not nearly as much fun.
Mr. Arseneault: I rely on the opposition to dig a little. I've even given them a question to ask once in a while, because I have a special interest in that committee. That's why I'm sitting there. I feel certain questions have to be asked for peace, order, and good government.
The Chair: Okay, time, information - too much, too little, too general, too detailed - no incentive - We could probably phrase that a little better.
Mr. Williams: ``No incentive'' meaning it doesn't matter what they propose, it means nothing to the government.
Mr. Arseneault: There's no follow-up.
Mr. Williams: No way to impact on decisions already made.
The Chair: Yes, okay.
Mr. Williams: I do think we should also lay out - we do know, for example, we're going to see what we perceive to be a better style of presentation by Treasury Board. If we're going to outlook documents for estimates, we should ask if they think they should be compressed into one document, provided they're clearly set, differentiated?
The Chair: John, could I suggest maybe that's a second-round questionnaire? In order not to prejudge what we'll hear from members of Parliament, we should get their impressions first. That would be a good check for us, that we are looking at the issues. But one thing we might include in here is your basic idea that you can't change anything.
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Mr. Arseneault: You hit a point there, that we may have to consider a series of questionnaires to highlight certain points -
The Chair: Yes, maybe once we narrow it down to some choices.
Mr. Arseneault: - especially if we're to attempt this thing, rather than have a big long questionnaire and everything and listing the options; maybe we don't have some of the options yet. But I'm just thinking of a preliminary one, being whether you're on committees, whether the committees studied the estimates last year or this year, why, why not. That type of deal is information we should have as soon as possible.
The next step is some of the options we're going to look at, maybe on another questionnaire. That way we could split Brian's time up a little bit better so he doesn't have to do it all at once.
The Chair: No, but let's face it; there's a limited number of members who are going to respond anyway. As Guy said, they're more likely to respond to a quick and easy check-off of one page, not two pages.
Mr. Williams: Yes; it can't go on indefinitely.
The Chair: Right.
Mr. O'Neal: Madam Chair, may I suggest that subcommittee members might like to include a question about the outlook documents, just to ask how many MPs saw the documents and whether they made use of them. I was also going to suggest that they be asked whether they or their committees have been consulted on possible improvements to the outlook documents.
Mr. Arseneault: That's a good question.
The Chair: Do we need another question in there? Question 4 really goes to what changes would be needed for your committee. What it doesn't ask about is you personally.
Mr. Williams: How do you phrase a question that asks or solicits the appropriate answer to why you aren't motivated to get into this and to take this as a major annual project? You know, we are spending $165 billion, we are seriously in debt, we are running a deficit. The country is concerned about it, and yet parliamentarians are not motivated to get right in and start asking the serious questions.
The Chair: Maybe we should change question 4 to target it to the individual instead of the committee. What changes would be needed for you personally to give more importance to examining the estimates?
Now, I don't know if there's a series of checkpoints you can suggest there, Guy.
Mr. Arseneault: We have to be careful of that one, because if we start putting a checklist on it, then we're showing our hand a little bit as to some of the options. Maybe we'll leave that one to the member for the comments, and we'll do a follow-up questionnaire coming into our reporting stage, listing our options, and asking which ones they would prefer if there were changes made. As you say, Madam Chair, if you start listing everything, they tend to give you the answers you want sometimes. So you have to be careful.
The Chair: Yes.
Mr. Williams: You mentioned, Madam Chairman, that your background was sociology, but I wonder if we should -
The Chair: That was after I gave up physics and math because they were not enough of a challenge.
Mr. Williams: I really don't want to get too much into psychology, but if we do have a fairly detailed question, maybe we want to ask that question twice, once right up front and then again when they've had time to think about it. Do they have some serious recommendations to make? It's amazing how, when you add some information, opinions can change.
Mr. Arseneault: Oh, yes. That's why people use propaganda a lot.
The Chair: I think we're going into two pages, and maybe that's okay.
Mr. Williams: I don't have a problem with two pages.
The Chair: My initial thinking was to get a quick and dirty reading.
Mr. Williams: I have a concern with quick and dirty, because you end up with general information. You may get this, but there's no analysis; we can't analyse it.
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The Chair: Yes. Then you feed it back to people and say, okay, here's what you told us; it's raised a few questions here.
Mr. Williams: What about the idea, Madam Chairman, that again, just in format or presentation, we deal with the personal questions to the MPs as they're individuals - what motivates or does not motivate you; how interested are you? - and then get into the procedure of saying ``These are ideas that may work. What do you think?'', with check-off boxes? Split it into personal/procedural for a style of presentation.
The Chair: My feeling on this, John, is that this is saying let's identify the problem first -
Mr. Williams: Or the other way around.
The Chair: - and then let's deal with solutions. It's a check for us, as much as anything, against our own thinking. Maybe we're way off-beam with what the problem is. I don't think so, but -
Mr. O'Neal: I hope you don't mind, but I'd just like to inject a note of caution. I know a number of political scientists have conducted surveys of members of Parliament in the past. They have found that the response rate is very low for a variety of reasons. For instance, members are much too busy to do these things.
So first of all, your idea of keeping it as short as possible is a good one. Second, I think the committee should treat the results with a fair amount of caution given that you may have a low response rate, and you wouldn't want to interpret your responses as being an expression of the will of the House.
The Chair: No.
Mr. O'Neal: This is why you might want to be a little bit careful about spelling out options, because you don't want to say in a report that members have told you that you must do A or B - or C, for that matter.
Mr. Williams: I would hope that because the questionnaire is coming from a committee the response rate might be a little bit higher, Brian. We also do have the opportunity of giving it a marketing plug at our caucus meetings.
The Chair: I think that'll be important. We'll all be having caucus meetings before the House comes back, and I think that will be extremely important.
Do we want people to tell us who they are? I don't feel it's necessary.
Mr. Williams: Absolutely not necessary, but I would put down there ``Signature optional''.
The Chair: They'll indicate who they are if they feel like indicating.
Mr. Williams: Yes.
Mr. O'Neal: I would leave it optional.
The Chair: I'm not even sure I'd put that in.
Mr. Williams: It's not a big affair. I would hope we would get in excess of 100 responses. I would like to see closer to 200.
The Chair: An optimist, hyperoptimist.
Mr. Arseneault: Thirty-nine.
Mr. Williams: Thirty-nine?
The Clerk: Fifty from the Reform Party.
Mr. Williams: Yes, we're going to tilt the balance.
Mr. Arseneault: Here's your chance.
The Chair: Would it be helpful to at least ask people to indicate which party they are in so that we'll know if we heard from a balance or not?
Mr. Arseneault: Do you mean we would throw out a certain segment?
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
The Chair: No, but we'd at least know -
Mr. Arseneault: We wouldn't do that, John.
The Chair: It might be interesting if in fact we heard from three times as many Reformers as we did government members. It would be interesting to know that in fact there's more interest there on this issue than there is in the government.
Mr. Arseneault: I would suspect there's more interest in the opposition, because we feel quite - and even John's saying there doesn't seem to be an interest now. There seems to be a problem with the debt and the deficit and this and that. I think if there's no interest, it must mean there's a good confidence that the finance minister has things in hand.
The Chair: Let's not get into the partisan debate here. This is going to be a consensus committee.
Mr. Arseneault: Maybe that should be one of the points here, that government has a good handle on finances.
Mr. Williams: One final potential suggestion you may want to consider, Madam Chairman - and I don't know how you run your caucus meetings - is whether it is possible to pass it around at the beginning of our caucus meeting and pick it up at the end. People could just complete it at the meeting and then we'd have it at the end of it. This would ensure a much higher response rate.
.1030
The Chair: Look, I would like to suggest some basic information. It would be helpful to know in fact which party a member belongs to, whether they're a chair or vice-chair of a committee - just yes or no. We've already asked them which committees they serve on.
Mr. Arseneault: ``Are you a new member?'' Would that have any bearing?
The Chair: Is that helpful?
Mr. Williams: I don't know that it's relevant, Madam Chair. The key thing we want is to find out their impressions about the process of supply. I'm sure it's going to vary from committee to committee, but I think it varies from committee to committee depending on the leadership of the committee. If the leadership were to change, the emphasis by committee could change as well.
Mr. Arseneault: You're right.
Mr. Williams: So I'm not sure it's that important to find out if they're chair, vice-chair, or which committee they sit on. But I do agree with you which party they belong to would be appropriate. I think what I will do is I will take it and hand it around the Reform caucus at the beginning of a caucus meeting and pick it up afterwards. That way I'll get a significant number of responses.
The Chair: No weeding out the ones you don't like, though, John.
Mr. Williams: On my word.
The Chair: What about timing? I think sending it out now would be absolutely pointless.
Mr. Arseneault: It's not ready now anyway.
The Chair: It could be finalized and sent out fairly early in January. Whether or not any of us is going to take it around our caucus, it should go out individually to the members from the clerk of the committee.
Mr. Arseneault: Yes, as an official document.
The Chair: Over my signature? I'm not sure.
Okay, over my signature, in early January, with a request that they respond before the end of January.
Mr. Williams: Yes.
Mr. Arseneault: Then when we return, we'll pass them out again in caucus, for those who want to do it that way. We'll probably have a high percentage of responses anyway.
Mr. Williams: That's going to give us a much better feel and cross-section than just 39 Reformers.
Mr. Arseneault: Is it going to affect your decision if you find out you're different from the rest of your caucus, John?
Mr. Williams: We need the input, Madam Chair. I think it's great we have the questionnaire. It will raise the profile of what we're trying to achieve. That in itself is not a bad idea, because it will just let them know the estimates process is -
The Chair: And that the changes we're trying to make are so Parliament can do its job better.
Future witnesses: As you probably can gather, I'm quite keen about having the committee chairs together, or as many as want to get together, for a discussion, and probably as soon after we return as possible, because after that they all get busy with their own committees. Initially there may be a chance to bring some of them together who won't be there later on.
Monday, February 5, in the evening. We would have a lot of people back in town. February 5 is when the House resumes.
Mr. Williams: Madam Chair, since all the committee chairs but one are government-side members, perhaps we should think more of having an equal cross-section of committees rather than the committee chairs.
The Chair: Okay. Any suggestions along that line?
Mr. Williams: I don't know how one would end up with an equitable split. I don't know what participation we'll have from the official opposition, because we've had none so far. Whether they're interested in pursuing this matter I don't know, but I would certainly like to see a reasonable Reform presence in that round table discussion.
The Chair: The level of support is not going to be that tremendous, to tell you the truth.
.1035
Mr. Williams: From the official opposition, you mean?
The Chair: I think generally from the committee chairs and other members of the committee.
Mr. Williams: We're only looking at twenty committees, so one per committee would be a maximum of twenty people. If we had a dozen showing up, that would be three or four Reformers, a couple from the Bloc, and half a dozen Liberals. I think that would be sufficient, because otherwise we're not even going to have a chance for everybody to have input.
Mr. Arseneault: How do you choose who's going to be here from which committee? For instance, do you say we'll ask for a Reformer to be present from natural resources, we'll ask for a Bloc member to come from finance, and we'll have a Liberal from human resources development? If you don't designate, they may all come from one party or not.
I think the chairperson's idea of having the chairperson of the committee, who knows the system maybe a little more than some of the members, is one way of doing it. It's not necessarily the best way.
But I'm a little worried; we want some feedback from them as to how some of these options would impact them. They're sitting at the front of the table while the estimate process is going on. They should have a better understanding than a lot of the MPs. I've found that they do normally. They know the estimates because they have to rule on a lot of things in terms of procedure and things of that nature. We want to have some input as to the impact of what we're considering and how they as committee chairs think the estimates could be better reviewed.
Mr. Williams: The concern I have, Madam Chairman, is the fact that quite a number of the committees never even picked up the estimates. We had much more participation last year, primarily through the urging of Reform. Therefore I'm not sure that we'd have a great deal of additional expertise in handling the estimates by having the chairs present. I'm a little skeptical about that.
The only concern I would have, of course, is that if we restrict it to chairs, we're restricting it to government members only.
Mr. Arseneault: That is a problem, but I don't know how to get around that.
The Chair: Let me make the suggestion that we would write to the committee chairs. We would ask them to identify one other member from their committee from each of the opposition parties - I would presume in the case of the Bloc it would be the vice-chair and in the case of Reform it would likely be the critic - and we would invite them.
If it looks like we're going to have too many people for a reasonable discussion, then we would pare down the number of committees and make some judgments about that and have two sessions if necessary. I would like to be sure that I thought we'd have at least one or two of the committees that will be receiving this new form of estimates, and a couple have had the old form of estimates.
Mr. Arseneault: I don't see that as an important issue. It might be more important next year when they've had the chance to look at it. We might be scaring them off.
Mr. Williams: I'm more concerned, Madam Chairman, about finding people who are interested enough to come forward voluntarily rather than saying we would want you, being a committee chair or a representative of the committee, be it a Reformer or whatever, to come forward and tell us. Why don't we just write to the committee chairs first, tell them we're having a small round table discussion, and ask: ``Are you or is any member of your committee from either of the other parties interested in coming forward?'' We may find that there's only a small number who feel motivated enough to come forward. These are the people we want.
The Chair: Okay, I like that. Again, we'd get that out early in January.
Mr. Williams: Yes.
The Chair: What's the thinking on having it the first Monday evening that the House is back? My concern is that we may be going back to meetings on code of conduct.
The Clerk: Not that Monday.
The Chair: Not that Monday? Okay, right. Most people come back for Question Period on the first day the House is back, I think. We can judge the response. If it's miserable because nobody is going to be back, then we'll move it to the next week.
Mr. Arseneault: We're in your hands, Madam Chair.
.1040
The Chair: Okay, we'll do it that way.
The next question that has been raised - and I think Peter Dobell raised it in his testimony - is whether the committee would be interested in travelling to Washington to see the committee system there operating.
Mr. Williams: I'm not enthusiastic, Madam Chairman. We do know the committee is full-time. We do know the committee has a significant research budget. We also know that because of the congressional style of government down there, they carry a great deal more impact than we do in our style of government as it is presently run.
I cannot really see us gaining significant enough amounts of knowledge so we can actually say it's important for us to go and sit down on a one-on-one basis with the people who are involved in Washington and say, ``Impart your knowledge to us because it's so important. We need it.''
The Chair: Mr. Arseneault.
Mr. Arseneault: The suggestion was first made by Mr. Dobell. I sort of concurred with it at the time, but I think we might be able to use our resources better if we could maybe ask one of them to come here. There may be times when some of their personnel are in our capital city as well, and maybe we could contact their committee to see when is the next time someone will be up here who has a background in that. That might be beneficial, if they're available.
The Chair: The system is so different that I'm not sure we can learn anything. If we got far enough along in our report that we felt we -
Mr. Arseneault: This is it.
What I would like to have, Brian, is maybe just a comparison of some of the systems that are used in various countries, the U.S. being one. It doesn't have to be a detailed comparison, but maybe just a diagram showing what they do in the U.S., Australia and maybe one other place, such as one of the Scandinavian countries.
Mr. O'Neal: If I could, I'll just make a number of observations.
First of all, Mr. Williams and the chair are absolutely correct: the congressional system is quite a bit different, especially since congressional committees have a direct say in the amount of appropriation a department or agency in the United States will receive. Because of that, the whole process is taken much more seriously. They can cut budgets for departments and agencies quite considerably, and therefore that means the departments and agencies take the work of congressional committees very seriously. It also means congressional committees have a considerable amount of resources with which to deal with these kinds of issues. That's my first comment.
Second, in your briefing binder there is a section that deals with supply in comparative perspective, but it looks at legislative systems that are similar to our own, so it looks at New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom.
Third, when I was checking to see whether or not someone from the Fraser Institute could come as a witness for the committee, they suggested that as an alternative we get someone to talk about the New Zealand system. They said basically that's what they would do if they were to come; they would discuss the New Zealand system.
The gentleman who is the high commissioner for New Zealand in Ottawa happens to be a former member of the New Zealand government. He was the Minister of Finance there and was intimately involved in the changes that were made to their financial management system. I think he also would be qualified to discuss what sorts of procedural changes were made in the New Zealand legislature to accommodate these other changes that were being made in the financial management system.
I have been in touch with the high commission. Mr. McTigue is willing to come and speak to the subcommittee if you're interested.
.1045
So apart from whatever goes on in Washington, subcommittee members may find the New Zealand experience is a little more relevant, especially since they've already had to deal with a number of the kinds of changes Treasury Board Secretariat seems to be talking about here.
The Chair: By the way, in March the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association is having a study group in New Zealand. I'm sorry, I've forgotten the details. I don't know if any of the members of this subcommittee have applied to go to that, but if they have, it would be an interesting opportunity to observe first-hand and meet with some officials and members of Parliament there. But from the look on your faces I don't detect that you have.
Mr. Arseneault: We wouldn't be selected anyway. Everyone wants to go to New Zealand at this time of the year. We'd be way down on the list. They don't do alphabetical here any more. I don't understand that.
Mr. Williams: I don't know either.
The Chair: Let me just conclude, then. At this time nobody sees a need to go to Washington; and I concur completely with that decision.
Future witnesses, then: We've had the suggestion that the high commissioner - That might be quite helpful.
Mr. Williams: There's no diplomatic problem about having a high commissioner appear before a subcommittee?
The Clerk: It's his choice to make, whether he comes or not. The committee can invite anybody they want. It's up to him to -
Mr. O'Neal: I did explore that possibility when I was speaking to people down at the high commission. They told me the high commissioner has in the past appeared before parliamentary committees, and no, he has no problem with that.
The Chair: Good.
Mr. Williams: I would suggest, Madam Chairman, we have our round table that's being planned. If we hear from the high commissioner from New Zealand, because of his background and because New Zealand has had a major restructuring of the whole financial system down there, it might be appropriate to hear from him. But I really don't want to hear from too many more witnesses. I'd like to cut if off and start having some discussions amongst ourselves on the direction we're going to take, because when we come back in February it'll take us some meetings to arrive at some conclusions.
The estimates are coming down on March 1, 1996. We're into a whole new round. If we don't get something going soon, if any recommendations are going to see the light of day, it'll be 1997 before they come into effect.
The Chair: I think we would like to aim at having some impact on the 1997 - We obviously are not going to for the 1996-97 estimates process and budget year.
Mr. Williams: You've written that off completely?
The Chair: We might by 1997-98.
Mr. Williams: Have you written this coming year off completely, Madam Chairman?
The Chair: Not entirely. That's why I think having a meeting with committee chairs and people interested in the committee aspect of it early in February might be one of the most likely ways to have a constructive influence on this year's process.
Mr. Arseneault: It might give them the sense also to start dealing seriously with the estimates. There has to be an attitudinal change by members of Parliament. It could change with the chairs and vice-chairs. If they're seized with our subject matter, which very few of them are at present, and there is a subcommittee studying this and we're going to be watching and implementing change, it's going to have an impact on them in the next process. We may not be able to effect change immediately, but the attitudinal change may come about.
I do know at one point someone made a statement - I don't know whether it was in caucus, through the House leader or the whip or someone - saying, listen, we're not doing our estimates and we should be doing our estimates more and more. People started thinking about it. The idea of meeting with committee chairs, vice-chairs, and even members, if they want, is very important for the attitudinal change, to show it's important and the committee is seized with that subject matter.
.1050
Mr. Williams: Don't we have a reporting date, Madam Chairman, of March or something?
The Chair: Yes, the end of March. I would like to put a bit of pressure on ourselves in February, if it's agreeable to everybody, to try to have two meetings a week. We'd keep Thursday morning as our main meeting time, but we'd try to -
It seems to me both of you tend to be here on Monday morning - or at least late Monday morning. We can confirm that when we come back after Christmas.
Monday evening would conflict with the code of conduct, which is a conflict for me and Mr. Arseneault and Mr. Malhi, at least, unless we could arrange to - well, no, we can't do that, because Ellen's clerk to both committees. We can't meet at the same time as they do. But I would like to try to make sure we're meeting twice a week, if possible, because we have three weeks in February, three weeks in March -
Mr. Arseneault: I don't have our schedule.
The Chair: I don't either. I know I'm likely to be away one of those weeks. I'd like to be very well along toward the draft report by the end of February.
Mr. Arseneault: I agree.
The Chair: Before we leave, it might be helpful, again in terms of identifying these chewable chunks, if each of you suggested which are the three things you would most like to go at. What do you think are the big chunks we have to deal with now?
Mr. Williams: I think the big chunks are the estimates, statutory programs and crown corporations. They're three small items, but they cover all spending by government.
The other side is the procedure of whether we do, for example, close the House down for a week, or whether we do have a special committee, that type of area.
The third one I see is the style of reporting. Where does confidence come in? How are we going to deal with that? I've mentioned, for example, requiring reports back from the government and data on reports that are tabled and so on.
The Chair: Would that fall, then, under what you call the review of the Standing Orders in the current procedures, that, yes, we think this is appropriate, and no, we think this needs to be changed - this type of thing?
Mr. Williams: Yes. I see these three areas: what we discuss; the environment within which we discuss it; and the methodology of reporting.
Mr. Arseneault: Basically, the other area is the supply days that should be looked at now -
The Chair: That would be under the procedure.
Mr. Arseneault: - and the methodology of reporting procedure. I tend to be a procedural person and like to see things change in that manner. How are the committees going to deal with it? Do we have a full-time committee or not? As John mentioned, does the House adjourn for a week or two weeks at certain times of the year?
I tend to think we should focus more on the process and the procedure rather than necessarily the written format, although I am concerned with the consistency of terminology and the use of that terminology from year to year.
I think John has basically summarized the big chunks there, and I think Brian has a good handle on it as well. That's key in a lot of this.
The Chair: I think that's very helpful. It's probably given our researcher and our clerk enough to do for the entire month of January. I'll review what we've gone through, and early in January I'll take the opportunity to probably meet again with our staff and try to make sure everything is as well-organized as possible for February so we can get done the work we need to get done.
Ellen, do you have something to add?
The Clerk: The Comprehensive Auditing Foundation has submitted an enormous brief.
The Chair: The Comprehensive Auditing Foundation had been invited. We cancelled their appearance to deal with Treasury Board's request. Ellen's telling me they have submitted an enormous brief, which we should circulate to all of you, but I think under the circumstances, since they have done that level of work, we should certainly invite them back.
The Clerk: It would be politic.
Mr. Arseneault: Yes.
The Chair: Okay.
The Clerk: It should be as early in February as possible.
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Mr. Williams: We may want to combine the visit with that of the high commissioner if we find their brief is either in agreement with or the antithesis of what the high commissioner might be saying.
The Chair: If we're looking at the possibility of a Monday night meeting with committee chairs and others and a Thursday morning meeting for the high commissioner if he's available, we might look at 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. for the high commissioner and 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. for the Comprehensive Auditing Foundation. We could certainly invite both of them to stay and comment on the presentation of the other or something like that.
Mr. Williams: My duty day, Madam Chairman, has changed to Friday, and I think it will be Friday through February and March. I try to spend one day in my constituency office, so that would likely now be Monday. I'd travel on Monday night to be here on Tuesday morning, and then, of course, I leave on Friday night around 6 p.m. I could handle maybe one or perhaps two Monday meetings by travelling through the day on Monday, but that means I don't have a day in the constituency office.
The Chair: So we will look at Thursday as when we will get the chunk of our work done and we'll see if there's another time when there aren't meetings of other committees that the members are involved in, when we could perhaps carve out an hour and a half or two hours for any additional business.
Mr. Arseneault: De we have another meeting at 11 a.m.?
The Chair: Yes, we do.
I will therefore adjourn this meeting.