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Results: 76 - 90 of 172
View Julie Dzerowicz Profile
Lib. (ON)
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Ms. Lang, for your excellent presentation. You covered a lot of territory very quickly, and thank you so much for your service to our nation.
We've mentioned a few times in different ways the impact of the COVID-19 programs on consumer and business insolvencies. Do you actually have numbers? Are you able to say that CERB actually stopped x number of insolvencies, and the wage subsidy actually...? Do you actually delve down, or do you just say that in general this is what we understand has happened?
Elisabeth Lang
View Elisabeth Lang Profile
Elisabeth Lang
2020-07-07 17:28
Based on our statistics that we report monthly on our website, we know that the numbers are down by about 50% this May versus last May. That would be one number you could look at. However, what you don't know is what they would have been, of course.
View Julie Dzerowicz Profile
Lib. (ON)
We're not able to to say that this program had more of an impact than another program. You're just able to give the overall bucket.
View Annie Koutrakis Profile
Lib. (QC)
View Annie Koutrakis Profile
2020-07-07 18:11
How are CERB and other COVID-19-related government support payments treated in insolvency proceedings?
Elisabeth Lang
View Elisabeth Lang Profile
Elisabeth Lang
2020-07-07 18:11
The CERB and the CESB for students both had specific wording added in their legislation that they would not be subject to the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act. This means they will not be treated as income.
If you go bankrupt, there's a surplus income provision that looks at your income and at all of your expenses. If you cross a certain threshold, based on your family's size, you are required to pay additional amounts to your bankruptcy estate, which will be distributed to your creditors. You're also required to stay in bankruptcy for a longer period, for 12 months longer. CERB and CESB would not be part of that calculation in those cases.
I think I can say that consistently, across the board, with the other benefits, the legislation is silent on their treatment in insolvency.
View Pierre Poilievre Profile
CPC (ON)
Excellent. Thank you very much.
The final point I would make is that right now.... You know, 10 years ago, we had the Auditor General doing 28 audits per year. Now we have the Auditor General doing approximately 14 audits per year. Ten years ago, the budget for the Government of Canada was about $250 billion. Today, it's over $500 billion. In other words, spending has doubled and the number of audits has gone down by half, so mathematically that means that we're getting a quarter of the accountability we were 10 years ago.
The previous auditor general—Mr. Ferguson, I mean—never accused the then government of having shortchanged his budget, so this is really unprecedented. I'm hoping that the government will correct the shortfall that it has created, and you will have the finance committee as an ally in pushing the government to do that.
Let's move on to the COVID response audit. What is your sense of the areas that you would focus on? You've said that you can't audit all of the COVID programs—it's just too vast—but is there a specific area on which you would like to focus your office's attention?
Karen Hogan
View Karen Hogan Profile
Karen Hogan
2020-06-22 12:19
We're almost at a point where I believe we could publish a list of topics that we're considering looking at. The way we've tackled the broad spectrum of what's going on in COVID is that we've looked at it in a short-term, a medium-term and a long-term aspect. In the short term, in addition to looking at overall preparedness, we are planning and have started to look at personal protective equipment, at Canada's food supply and.... I'm just trying to find the third one that I listed.
I'm sure, Mr. Hayes, you'll remember the third one. We were just talking about it this morning.
Andrew Hayes
View Andrew Hayes Profile
Andrew Hayes
2020-06-22 12:20
Yes, indeed. The spending and design of the CERB was the other main area that I think we were going to mention.
Karen Hogan
View Karen Hogan Profile
Karen Hogan
2020-06-22 12:20
Thank you, Andrew. It came to mind just as you mentioned it.
View Julie Dzerowicz Profile
Lib. (ON)
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
I want to add my sincere and warm congratulations to you, Ms. Hogan, on your appointment to be our new Auditor General. It's an important role. Thank you for your service to our nation.
I want to start by correcting something on the record. My colleague Mr. Julian indicated that the only time there's ever an increase in the Auditor General's budget is when there is a minority government. I think as you just stated, and as the interim Auditor General indicated the last time you met with us, in 2017 there was actually an increase of just over $7 million. In budget 2018 our government committed to investing more than $41 million in additional dollars. I know there's more to come, but I wanted to make sure it was on the record that dollars did flow, and in a majority government, in our last Parliament.
My first question for you is with regard to your point 11. You mentioned that our committee's motion calls on the Auditor General to “audit all federal programs associated with Canada's COVID-19 response”. Is that the intention? While there is a motion, would it be typical that the Auditor General would audit 100% of the programs or is it the intention that you will do 50%, 70%, 75%?
If you could clarify that, it would be appreciated.
Karen Hogan
View Karen Hogan Profile
Karen Hogan
2020-06-22 12:53
I did raise it, I guess, in order to provide a little bit of clarity to that. To go back to the motion, it did say all programs within COVID and all the audits that we were intending on doing. As an independent audit office, it's very important to be able to have the choice to audit what you want, when you want and to the extent that you want.
I simply wanted to highlight that auditing all of the COVID programs would be astronomical. There are just so many. We would likely be doing just that for many years to come, which we don't believe is the best thing for Parliament and the best for Canadians.
There are many important programs out there that we need to look at. There's military spending. We would love to go back and look at cybersecurity, something that we have delayed. We think the reliance on technology across the entire country has made it very clear that this is an important audit to look at. We'd love to do a follow-up on connectivity in the north. There are so many—
View Julie Dzerowicz Profile
Lib. (ON)
Ms. Hogan, I'm sorry to interrupt. You're just saying that you're not intending on all programs, but it would be a subsection.
Karen Hogan
View Karen Hogan Profile
Karen Hogan
2020-06-22 12:54
We're going to look at risk and at where we'll have the best impact and value, so yes, that is our intention. We just wanted to highlight that we can't look at what the motion said, which was all programs.
View Julie Dzerowicz Profile
Lib. (ON)
Perfect. At this point, you don't have any idea of whether it's 25% or 50%, but you'll just kind of take it as it comes along.
Results: 76 - 90 of 172 | Page: 6 of 12

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