Strengthening parliamentary scrutiny of the estimates.

AuthorLeGresley, TinaLise

The House of Commons Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates has a mandate, amongst other matters, to review and report on the process for considering the estimates and supply. The Committee began a review of this issue in February 2012. It held 13 meetings and heard from 31 witnesses, including knowledge observers, academics, departmental officials, and international experts. On June 20, 2012, the Committee presented its report to the House of Commons. The report made 16 recommendations to improve the procedures, structure, and support related to parliamentary scrutiny of the estimates. The government presented its response to the report on October 18, 2012. This article summarizes the report's observations and recommendations, as well as the government's response.

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One of the fundamental roles of Parliament is to review and authorize the government's expenditure of public funds. To this end, the government presents its spending plans to Parliament in the form of "estimates," which are then referred to and scrutinized by the appropriate standing committee. In this way, Parliament can hold the government to account for its spending. However, it has long been acknowledged that Parliament does not effectively fulfill its role and standing committees are at best making a cursory review of the government's spending plans.

There have been two wide-ranging reviews of the estimates process at the federal level, one in 1998 and the other in 2003, but few changes were made as a result of these reviews. (1) As dissatisfaction with Parliament's role in the scrutiny of government spending remains, both among observers and many members of Parliament, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates (henceforth, the Committee) began a study in February 2012 on the process for considering estimates and supply. Over several months, the Committee heard from former members of Parliament, departmental officials, academics, international experts, the Auditor General of Canada, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, former clerks of the House of Commons, the New Zealand House of Representatives, and the Senate of Australia, and other knowledgeable observers.

The Committee focused its study by examining the estimates process on three levels--procedures, structure, and support. The Committee believed that greater and better scrutiny of the estimates could be achieved by improving the parliamentary processes to consider the estimates, ensuring that parliamentarians have clear and understandable estimates information, and providing sufficient support and capacity for members to interpret the information available. As outlined below, the Committee sought in its report to make focused and modest recommendations that would result in progress in these select areas.

Observations and Recommendations

Accrual versus Cash Appropriations: One of the issues that has been of concern to the Committee is that it is difficult to compare the government's spending plans, outlined in the main and supplementary estimates, to...

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