2012–13 Performance Report and 2014–15 Report on Plans and Priorities of the Office of the Auditor General of Canada

Opening Statement to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts

2012–13 Performance Report and 2014–15 Report on Plans and Priorities of the Office of the Auditor General of Canada

31 March 2014

Michael Ferguson, CPA, CA
FCA (New Brunswick)
Auditor General of Canada

Mr. Chair, we are pleased to be here and would like to thank you for this opportunity to discuss our 2012–13 Performance Report and our 2014–15 Report on Plans and Priorities. With me today is Lyn Sachs, Assistant Auditor General of Corporate Services and Chief Financial Officer.

We serve Parliament by supporting its oversight of government spending and performance with our financial audits, performance audits, special examinations of Crown corporations, and the work of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development.

All of our audits are conducted in accordance with Canadian Auditing Standards and Canadian Standards on Quality Control. We subject our System of Quality Control to internal practice reviews and monitoring, and to periodic external reviews, to provide assurance that you can rely on the quality of our work.

2012–13 Performance Report

During our 2012–13 fiscal year, the period covered by our most recent performance report, we used $88.2 million of the $93.8 million in parliamentary appropriations available to us, resulting in a lapse of $5.6 million. We had a budget of 615 full-time equivalent employees and employed the equivalent of 603 full-time employees—a decrease of 37 from the year before. These results reflect the progress we made on implementing the reductions planned in our Strategic and Operating Review proposal.

With these resources, all but four of our scheduled audits were completed. Two of the audits that were not completed were the special examination for the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board, which was cancelled as the organization was wound up, and the special examination for the Canada Lands Company Limited, which was delayed to allow us to take into account significant organizational changes in the corporation.

Our 2012–13 Performance Report contains a number of indicators of the impact of our work and measures of our operational performance. The tables containing our targets and actual performance results are attached to this statement.

These tables show that our clients and the senior managers in the organizations we audit find that our audits add value. They also show that the Office participated in 27 committee hearings and briefings, compared with 29 the previous year, and that parliamentary committees reviewed 30 percent of our performance audits, compared with 48 percent the previous year. The report also shows that departments made satisfactory progress in addressing 72 percent of the 25 performance audit recommendations that we followed up on that year.

Of the seven qualifications noted in our financial audit reports that were not addressed, five were mainly for failing to file annual reports on time, while only two were related to auditing or accounting matters. There were no significant deficiencies identified in the three special examinations that we completed this year, and all previous deficiencies have been addressed.

Our measures of organizational performance remained positive, with our on-budget performance for all of our financial audits improving over the previous year. Eight of our performance audits exceeded their planned budget, in many cases because of expansion of the audit scope.

Our most recent employee survey, conducted in the last fiscal year, showed that employee engagement remained high, with 95 percent of employees feeling proud to work for the Office.

2014–15 Report on Plans and Priorities

Looking forward, we have articulated a new set of strategic objectives for the Office and identified four areas where we believe we can make improvements. In planning for 2014–15, we will be working to make progress in each of these areas.

First, we want to ensure that our audits are adding value for parliamentarians, territorial legislators, Crown corporation boards of directors, and audit committees. Second, we will be working to make our governance and decision-making practices and processes as efficient and economical as possible. Third, having completed the updating of our audit methodology last year, we will be looking at opportunities to implement our audit methodology as efficiently and economically as possible. Finally, we have begun talking with our staff about ensuring that we operate in an environment where our employees feel more empowered to do their work.

In 2014–15, we will complete our action plan to reduce operating costs, based on the Strategic and Operating Review proposal that we submitted to Parliament in October 2011. Our budget shows that we will reduce our staff levels and achieve our planned spending reduction of over $6.5 million one year in advance of our target.

While we have reduced the number of financial audits we undertake by 25 and will continue to look for efficiencies, we are confident that we can serve Parliament with this reduced funding. We expect to complete more than 95 financial audits, 27 performance audits, and 4 special examinations in the 2014–15 fiscal year. We are also conducting an audit of the Senate of Canada at the Senate’s request.

I would like to take this opportunity to welcome Julie Gelfand as the new Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. Julie joined the Office on March 24. She brings over 25 years of diverse experience in the field, including senior positions at Rio Tinto, Vice-President of Sustainable Development at the Mining Association of Canada, and President of Nature Canada.

In conclusion, Mr. Chair, my staff and I thank you for your ongoing interest in and support of our work. We look forward to providing you with valuable assurance, information, and advice in the coming year.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. We would be pleased to answer your questions.

Indicator Table 1—Summary of our indicators of impact

Indicator Table 2—Summary of our organizational performance