Table of Contents

Composition of the Committee

Introduction

Reporting to the Legislative Assembly:

1. What Information Should Be Reported?
2. Should Government Issue Government-Wide and Sectoral Reports?
3. Should Government Organizations Be Directly Accountable to Client Groups?

Legislative Committees

The Estimates Process

Implementation Process

Summary of Recommendations

Appendix A	Terms of Reference
Appendix B	Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector — Lines of Inquiry
Appendix C	Accountability and Performance Management — Reference Sources
Appendix D	Supporting Documentation
Appendix E	Financial Administration Act (excerpts)
Appendix F	Committee of Supply Comparisons
Appendix G	Minutes of Proceedings

Introduction

In July, 1995, the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts was asked to review the joint report of the Auditor General and the Deputy Ministers' Council entitled Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector. The report outlines the first step in an important initiative for bringing about accountability for results. It notes that a focus on results is critical, not only to government in managing its programs and services on behalf of the public, but to legislators in assessing that performance.

Citizens have a right to know how they are being governed; this means knowing what government intends to achieve and what it actually achieved on their behalf. As legislators, we need to be able to demonstrate to citizens that the institutions of government do work. At the same time, we must recognize that accountability is not an end in itself. Information that supports public accountability and decision-making is information to support good governance. In calling for accountability information, we need to encourage the public sector to examine the programs and services it delivers in terms of results, in particular, the outcomes that will benefit society.

Clearly this issue has captured the interest of the Legislative Assembly. Special consideration was given to the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts to meet, for the first time, while the House was in recess — a significant departure from previous practice. (The expanded Terms of Reference for the Committee are at Appendix A.)

The Committee has met several times since the report Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector was referred to it. Two official public meetings were held as part of our review so that we could hear the views of experts, from different sectors, knowledgeable in performance measurement and accountability issues. These hearings were supplemented by testimony from the Auditor General and the Deputy Minister of Finance as well as from ministry executives and line staff. (Transcripts of the meetings of the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts are available from Hansard or can be accessed on the Internet.)

A subcommittee was also formed and attended a conference, in Austin, Texas, with the theme "Managing for Results". The conference included workshops for public officials and others grappling with the concepts of accountability and performance measurement in the public and private sectors.

Finally, the Committee established lines of inquiry that it could pursue in its review. (These lines of inquiry are included in this report as Appendix B.) While there are numerous issues worthy of review, given the time available and the possibility of change, the Committee chose to focus on three key questions:

• What information should government be required to report to the Legislative Assembly?

• How should legislative committees hold government to account?

• How should the budget/estimates process be incorporated into the accountability process for the Legislative Assembly?

This report contains our recommendations outlining how government and the Legislative Assembly can enhance accountability for performance in the British Columbia public sector. We urge the Assembly, in the interests of the public, MLAs and the public sector alike, to accept and implement these recommendations.

"This is a tool for better governance; this is a tool so that government has the opportunity to change its focus and ensure that government programs and ministry objectives are more clearly defined, more clearly stated, so that there's a means of responsibility. The accounting and reporting out processes — the accountability process — are just the final closing of the loop." (F. Gingell)

  "I think that what we're doing at the moment is trying to give encouragement to the bureaucracy and to get educated ourselves — to tell them, first of all, whether we are supportive of this governance tool, of changing this measurement system, and whether the legislators will feel it's a worthwhile project and they will use it." (F. Gingell)

Reporting to the Legislative Assembly

When we talk about accountability in government, it relates to outcomes.... It's not so much what's being spent that gets (people) concerned. If they understand what that goal is, what the outcome is supposed to be, that allows them to better understand why it takes so many millions of dollars to do what we're doing. We really have to push that the emphasis needs to switch to the outcomes...." (M. Farnworth)

"With more information about outcomes and more publicity about that, and more opportunities for us as individual legislators to then take that out into our communities — we can do a great deal to give more confidence to our public...." (A. Hagen)

Accountability — the obligation to account for responsibilities conferred — requires that government provide the Legislative Assembly with meaningful information about its performance. To be meaningful to the Assembly, this information should allow for comparison between what government intended to achieve (its plans) and what it actually achieved (its results) for the range of its activities. This would include, not only the financial performance of a government, but its operational and program performance as well as its legal compliance, fairness, equity and probity.

Some information about the intentions of government are available now at the government-wide level. At the beginning of each session, for example, the government outlines, in the Speech from the Throne, the general legislative program it intends to implement. It also publishes its expenditure Estimates at the same time that the Minister of Finance and Corporate Relations delivers the annual budget speech highlighting new expenditure and revenue initiatives. While the Estimates describe the Government's spending intentions for each vote, including the limits of the amounts that may be spent and, in general terms, the purposes for which the expenditure will be made, the Estimates focus on inputs — the resources used to carry out a task over a given period. The Estimates are not program-based and do not provide the outputs, the cost of the outputs or the intended outcomes to be achieved.

At the organizational level, the strategic and business plans of ministries and Crown corporations are not required to be tabled before the Legislative Assembly. Although most government organizations are required, by legislation, to table with the Legislative Assembly an annual report on the operations of the organization for the previous year, there is little direction as to the content, format, or timing of these reports. Consequently, the annual reports of ministries and Crown corporations tend to focus on the organization's activities, rather than report on results achieved compared to what was intended. Furthermore, annual reports are generally tabled too late to be of value to the

Assembly in assessing the performance of government. Nonetheless, the annual report, if improved in content and timing, could serve as a primary accountability document. Consideration, however, should also be given to the use of emerging technology as an alternative means for providing results information in an accurate and timely way.

Clearly, the Estimates and Budget Speech focus on government's financial performance, reflecting the Assembly's historical concern with compliance with spending authorities. What is not available, however, is meaningful information about the remainder of a government's activities: its operational and program performance and its legal compliance, fairness, equity and probity. The information that is currently available does not allow the Assembly to compare the achievements of a government with its intentions for the range of its activities.

"I'm hoping that we can look not just at measuring the number of graduates in any given year, but at actually what happens to those graduates — not just on June 30 of any given year, but six months later, two years later and even five to ten years later, to track those individuals in the system, to get some long-term benefit from all the data collection that goes on." (L. Reid)

Information about the intended and actual results of a government's performance is important if the Assembly is to determine what difference government has made in the lives of its citizens. Ideally, this would mean knowing the outcomes that government has achieved through its programs and services as well as understanding how these programs are relevant to the needs of citizens and to the overall priorities of government. We recognize that outcomes are not always easy to define or measure; furthermore, it would be unrealistic to expect all outcomes to be .measured on an annual basis. As legislators, we believe, however, that by focusing on outcomes we can demonstrate to the public whether government is achieving the objectives it has set. We want to know, over time, what sort of progress is being made toward long-term goals. We need to know how government intends to measure progress and how often.

Although outcomes are of real interest to legislators, it is also important to know about outputs (the goods and services provided by government programs): what was their quality? what did they cost? how satisfied is the public with what it has received? Currently, however, information about a government's performance tends to focus on other measures such as inputs (the resources used to carry out a program over a given period), process (the activities undertaken and how) and compliance with spending authorities (whether money was spent within the limits and for the purposes authorized).

In addition to the results (the outcomes and outputs) of government programs, we need assurance that government is conducting its business is a way that complies with legislation and related authorities. As well, recognizing that many factors have an impact on the outcomes achieved, we need assurance that government is managing its affairs appropriately.

Recommendations

"I think we can continue the debate about program reporting or ministry reporting, but it would make a whole lot more sense for the public if we talked about sectors. The example we raised this morning ... was kindergarten through to career. How do we measure the viability of our programming? If we as legislators can move to some kind of understanding that we want to report out on the sectors, I think we would advance this discussion immeasurably." (L. Reid)

Much of what government does today transcends the activities of individual ministries and Crown corporations. Protecting the environment, for example, is a shared objective of the Ministries of Environment; Forests; and Agriculture, Fisheries and Food; and of BC Hydro. Knowing whether the objective has been achieved requires meaningful information at a higher level — at a level that crosses traditional organizational boundaries and reports on outcomes. The emphasis, then, is no longer on individual programs but on how they inter-relate to achieve a shared outcome.

Sectoral reporting — reporting on major policy areas such as the environment, transportation and health — is one way of providing legislators with information about broad outcomes. At present, for example, financial information is "rolled up" and consolidated, on a government-wide basis, in the government's summary level financial statements. A similar approach was taken with The State of the Environment Report. More recently, the Provincial Health Officer has tried to identify health indicators. The emphasis is not just on health but also on poverty, employment and education so that, taken together, he might determine the effect these issues have on people's health. We recognize that this may be difficult to achieve without clear targets and sets of programs based on performance standards in a sector but believe that an attempt should be made to report on sectors.

As legislators, we need to look at what government is doing and begin to examine that work to ensure that the outcomes achieved are as close as possible to the objectives set, that the results are measured in the long term and that there is some means available to modify the programs. Sectoral reporting could assist us in that assessment.

Recommendation

It is on behalf of the public that the Legislative Assembly assesses the performance of government. It does so by examining broad public policy areas, where the decisions of government often carry a high price tag, and, more recently, by questioning government as to the outcomes it seeks. But there is another aspect to accountability: the quality of the service that is being delivered. Citizens tend to judge this aspect of performance for themselves, on a daily basis — whenever they apply for a driver's licence, travel the roads or stay in a provincial park, for example. As legislators, we need to ensure that citizens have the information on which they can make a fair assessment. We believe government can do so by establishing and reporting on performance standards for the programs and services that government delivers.

It is difficult for individuals to fairly assess the performance of government — and difficult for MLAs to respond to complaints — where there are no standards of service. The best example of service standards that we know of is in the United Kingdom. There, as part of the Citizen's Charter, public service standards and the results achieved are published so that citizens can take action where the service is unacceptable. These standards have to do with issues such as how quickly you receive your driver's licence; whether your train arrived on time; and the length of patient waiting lists. When service is poor, citizens may, in some cases, receive compensation such as a partial refund on their train ticket. More importantly, poor performance, as defined by the consumer, can have direct consequences for those who do not perform well. Patients, for example, may choose the services of another hospital, given information such as patient waiting lists. In the long run, public sector organizations that lose their market may also lose their funding.

The issue of public information, however, is more complex than this — it is not simply whether the trains run on time or how long patients must wait. In assessing the performance of government, we believe citizens also need clarity around their entitlements versus the expectations they have of what is available to them. It has to do with helping people through a system that is complex and where they do not necessarily know the rules and opportunities that are there, particularly as those entitlements change. The issue of information (what people know, what they understand and how we help them) and providing clarity about entitlements is the responsibility of many people: front-line workers, supervisors and MLAs. We believe government should do more than establish and report on performance standards. It should also ensure that citizens clearly understand their entitlements.

Recommendation

Legislative Committees

"There has to be a reason why this particular committee of the Legislature is involved in this joint committee process to produce a report on accountability, and I think our unique role is to recognize what changes should be made in the Legislature and its committees to improve the accountability mechanism." (D. Schreck)

Accountability is not served simply because information is reported to the Legislative Assembly. If the Assembly is to assess the performance of government, it must inform itself about what government intends to achieve and what it actually achieves. This means the Assembly must actively use the information it receives in assessing the performance of government. Potentially, the most effective tool available to the Assembly in this respect is the legislative committee. We would like to see, as a way of improving accountability and increasing the power of the Legislative Assembly, fundamental reforms to the way legislative committees currently operate.

At present in British Columbia, legislative committees are appointed but not necessarily convened. The most active legislative committee is the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts; by contrast, the Select Standing Committee on Finance, Crown Corporations and Government Services (and its predecessor) has not met in several years.

The power of legislative committees is constrained in a number of ways: legislative committees cannot undertake inquiries without a matter being referred by the Assembly, they require authority from the House to sit intersessionally or while the House is, itself, sitting, and they cannot sit after the House has prorogued. Other conditions apply.

Based on past experience with legislative committees, we believe:

• the coverage of government performance is incomplete. Crown corporations and funded agencies are a vital part of the public sector in British Columbia and yet their operations and activities have not been scrutinized by legislative committees;
• government performance is not assessed in a systematic fashion. The strategic and business plans, as well as the annual reports, of ministries and Crown corporations are not referred to legislative committees. Consequently, Committee Members are unable to compare the intentions of government's programs and services with the results achieved; and
• the time available to legislative committees is insufficient to carry out their accountability function. This is based on the experience of the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts. In recent years, the Committee has had, on average, only 17 hours per session in which to review, in detail, the public accounts and the reports of the Auditor General. While the Auditor General has moved to periodic reporting, this may be of little value to the Committee if it cannot continue to meet at any time and receive reports without the formality of tabling them. This issue will be just as critical to other legislative committees if the plans and annual reports of government's organizations are automatically referred to these committees.

"It seems to me that we should have a process that is modified to the point that we could call in the RCMP, the truckers' associations and all those agencies which directly use that infrastructure, including rapid transit and BC Transit — all of them — so that we could create and have a common goal as to what's in the best interests of the Province of British Columbia. That would be far more constructive. It would allow me to go home to my constituency, which hasn't had one road paved in 20 years, and say: "Yes, I recognize it's a need. It's seen as a need, but here are all those other problems in the Province of British Columbia, and here's how we fit into that overall goal." (L. Fox)

We believe it would be a step in the right direction of reform if a legislative committee could meet once struck, with its own mandate, irrespective of a further motion from the Legislative Assembly authorizing a meeting. A reduced quorum would ensure that meetings would not be frustrated by partisan interests.

"If we don't increase the power of the Legislature to act ... then there is no role for the Legislative Assembly in accountability, other than exposing information and hoping somebody else will do something." (D. Schreck)

We would suggest that legislative committees be organized by sector, such as health, transportation, or integrated resource management. Further, given the Assembly's interest in knowing the results of government's performance, we believe the short and long term plans, as well as the annual reports, of ministries and Crown corporations should be automatically referred to the appropriate legislative committee. Performance audit reports of the Auditor General should also be referred to the appropriate sectoral legislative committee.

The Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts should continue to function and be responsible for reviewing financial reports, including audit reports of the Auditor General. However, there are many other Members of the Assembly who do not sit on the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts. These members have much to offer and could well contribute to the Assembly's role in accountability by serving as members of legislative committees structured around sectors. It may well be that in bringing their personal knowledge and experience to these legislative committees, the examination of government's performance will focus less on the money spent and more on the outcomes achieved.

Recommendations

The Estimates Process

The consensus, among legislators and public servants alike, is that the Estimates process requires fundamental change. In examining this process, it is useful to distinguish between the business of passing the budget and the legislative review of the Estimates.

In fact, few legislators view the Estimates process as having much to do with a fiscal framework or budgeting. The reality is that in British Columbia, as in other provinces, the Legislative Assembly has limited alternatives when dealing with the Estimates. The Assembly cannot increase the amount of any vote nor can it introduce new votes. It can only reject, reduce, or approve the votes as presented to it. Since the party in power usually holds the majority of seats, it is unlikely that the Legislative Assembly would reject or reduce expenditure proposals.

Apart from this issue, the process for approving spending is focused almost exclusively on inputs, such as personnel numbers, not on outcomes. Yet it is outcomes that are of real interest to legislators and the public. Instead, the Estimates Blue Book provides information at a vote level which is so aggregated that it is of limited use. Annual reports, which could provide more detailed program information, are either not available or are a year or more out of date.

Despite the interest in outcomes, which generally take more than a year to realize, the spending approval process focuses on annual appropriations. Multi-year budgeting, however, has a number of advantages: it allows planning and resource allocation to be based on the natural cycle of a program or service; it allows for full testing of new programs, which may take some time to fully implement; and it allows organizations to plan for and accommodate to reductions in program funds.

Multi-year budgeting can be approached in two ways: by incorporating multi-year budgets into single year appropriations or by authorizing spending approvals beyond one year, based on a multi-year plan. This latter approach would represent significant reform to the Estimates process and would require a phased-in approach in order to test its feasibility. Incorporating multi-year budgets into single year appropriations may not be the ideal approach but, in the short term, is achievable.

The other aspect of the current Estimates process has to do with legislative review of ministry spending plans. It is, in essence, an accountability session that is less structured and less formal than Question Period. During these sessions, when there is good will on both sides, important points can be dealt with in a fairly short period of time, some differences can be drawn or agreements reached. In considering reform of the Estimates process, we believe it is important to preserve this open-ended accountability session for each ministry. This would allow legislators to address local constituency issues or to hold a Minister to account for the performance of a program.

We believe that reform of the Estimates process should reflect its dual nature: that is, the budget process and the legislative review. The reform we contemplate would recognize the limited alternatives the Assembly has in dealing with the budget. At the same time, it acknowledges the very real role that we, as legislators, can play in the legislative review of government and its organizations. In other words, we suggest that the Assembly choose to simply approve the budget prior to March 31st. This would be followed with legislative review, through the appropriate sectoral legislative committee, of ministries and Crown corporations and would focus on programs and program targets, what each organization wanted to accomplish, where each organization is going and how it will measure its performance. The short and long term plans, as well as multi-year budgets, of the ministries and Crown corporations would be essential to this review. See Appendix F for a comparison of Committees of Supply.

Recommendations

The proposed reforms mean that there would no longer be a Committee of Supply. The time spent in the House debating the Budget is intended to include enough time for as many Members to speak who wish to do so. The House would be free to concentrate on the legislative program of Government and Private Members' business. Committee of Supply is replaced by a process that would see referrals of specific Ministry and Crown Corporation programs to Select Standing Committees who would meet primarily at the Parliament Buildings throughout the year. The current number of Select Standing Committees would be reduced to around six and still be available for the House to refer other matters, as in the past, to them.

Implementation Process

Your committee believes the recommendations we have made will not only encourage good governance but enhance the Assembly's public scrutiny of government's performance. These recommendations will result in profound changes in the way public servants and legislators do their work. We recognize the challenge of implementing these recommendations but believe that the benefits to the public, to the legislators who represent them, and to the public sector are worth the effort. An implementation process that accommodates and explains these changes will, in the end, deliver the Committee's intended results of improving public confidence in its provincial government and Members of the Legislative Assembly.

Bringing about change takes time. We suggest the recommendations be phased in over a period of several years. A Special Committee of the Legislative Assembly, working in close consultation with the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly, the Clerk of Committees, the Auditor General, the Comptroller General and Treasury Board, would be a productive tool to oversee and direct the implementation process.

Summary of Recommendations

Recommendation # 1

Your Committee supports the initiatives of the Auditor General and Council of Deputy Ministers with respect to enhancing accountability and recommends that the Government of the Province of British Columbia publicly provide, on a timely basis:

Recommendation # 2

Your Committee recommends that the Government of the Province of British Columbia consider how best to make use of emerging technologies to make accountability information accessible to the public at a reasonable cost.

Recommendation # 3

Your Committee recommends that the Government of British Columbia pursue ways of providing information on a sectoral basis.

Recommendation # 4

Your Committee recommends that the Government of British Columbia consider how it could best provide information to users of government programs and services with respect to the standards of service it intends to deliver.

Recommendation # 5

Your Committee recommends that the number of Select Standing Committees be realigned to provide for a Committee on Public Accounts; Standing Orders, Privileges and Private Bills; and such other Committees deemed appropriate to consider Government Ministry and Crown Corporation programs by sector.

Recommendation # 6

Your Committee recommends that the new sectoral Committees of the Legislative Assembly be used consistently and with an expanded terms of reference enabling a more thorough review of matters referred to them.

Recommendation # 7

Your Committee recommends that the Select Standing Committees of the House be established for the duration of a Parliament with the ability to meet intersessionally and that all Members of the Legislative Assembly should have the opportunity to attend any meeting of any Select Standing Committee examining a Ministry or Crown Corporation Program and, in consultation with the Chairperson, be permitted time to enter debate on the issue(s) under discussion.

Recommendation # 8

Your Committee recommends that the short and long-term plans and annual reports of government ministries and Crown Corporations, once tabled in the House, stand referred to the appropriate legislative committee.

Recommendation # 9

Your Committee recommends that the Legislative Assembly review the entire the Estimates process, including proposals to replace the current practice with one which is more responsive, accountable and expeditious and incorporating multi-year budgets and single-year appropriations.

Recommendation # 10

Your Committee recommends that the Standing Orders of the Legislative Assembly and relevant Statutes of British Columbia be amended to reflect the proposed new practice:

Appendix A

Terms of Reference

On July 13, 1995 the Hon. Joy MacPhail, Minister of Social Services, on behalf of the Minister of Finance and Corporate Relations moved the following motion:

That the Report of the Auditor General of British Columbia and Deputy Ministers' Council, dated June 1995, entitled Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector, be referred to the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts; and that in addition to the powers previously conferred upon the said Committee, the Committee be empowered:

and shall report to the House as soon as possible, or following any adjournment, or at the next following Session, as the case may be; to deposit the original of its reports with the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly during a period of adjournment and upon resumption of the sittings of the House, the Chair shall present all reports to the Legislative Assembly.

The motion was adopted.

Appendix B

ENHANCING ACCOUNTABILITY FOR PERFORMANCE IN THE BRITISH COLUMBIA PUBLIC SECTOR

Lines of Inquiry

Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts

DEFINING GOVERNMENT INTENTIONS IN PLANS:

Planning — the setting of clear, measurable objectives linked to government's strategic plan — is key to knowing what government intends to do and why. Generally, however, accountability documents to the Legislative Assembly do not provide this information. The Estimates, for example, are focused on inputs; they are not program-based and do not set out clearly the outputs, the cost of the outputs, or the intended outcomes to be achieved. Furthermore, at the organizational level, the strategic and business plans of ministries and Crown corporations are not required to be tabled before the Legislative Assembly.

Would the Assembly want to know:

• What is the organization's purpose?
• How does this purpose relate to its legislated mandate and how does it contribute to government-wide goals?
• What are the organization's overall goals (i.e. intended outcomes)? Why?
• How will progress toward these goals be measured? How often will progress be measured?
• What are the main strategies (i.e., initiatives and programs) to be used to achieve the goals? Why?
• What are the performance targets for the current year? (e.g., levels of service, efficiency, quality of service)
• Are the performance targets realistic in light of past performance?
• What will it cost to achieve the goals? Is this cost reasonable?
• How will these costs be funded?

REPORTING ON RESULTS:

Although the annual reports of ministries and Crown corporations are key accountability documents, there is little direction provided to organizations as to the content required. Generally, these reports do not identify the objectives and results or outcomes achieved for the year. In addition, ministry annual reports are often tabled up to two years late.

If accountability is to be focused on results, would the Legislative Assembly want to know:

• What are the results of the current period's activities?
  • did the organization achieve what it set out to achieve?
  • what did it cost?
  • did it achieve planned performance standards?
  • if not, why not?
  • did it conduct business in accordance with legislation and regulations, and with fairness, equity and probity?
• What progress is being made toward achieving the overall corporate (long-term) goals?
• What is the state of organizational strength?
  • is there appropriate management direction?
  • are key assets being protected?
  • is the ministry responsive to changing circumstances?
  • is there a good working environment?
  • is key information monitored and reported?

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
There are three broad dimensions to consider in reporting on stewardship and performance:

• historical financial information and results of operations — financial performance, financial statements, public accounts, etc.;
• stewardship and adherence to authority provided — compliance with authority; and
• achievement — the efficacy or effectiveness of the administration of public policy, of risk management, of the choices and trade-offs that had to be made. (Oct 24)

To look at what constitutes reasonable performance information for accountability to the Legislature, and by the Legislature to the public, you have to look at ideas that transcend all three categories: for example, relevance, appropriateness, impacts and efficacy of programs. (Oct 24)

Performance information in the public sector is not revealing unless it's cast in the context of what you intended to do and what your goals, targets and intended outcomes were. Governing bodies and the executive of government have to be willing, beforehand, to state those intended outcomes and objectives. (Oct 24)

Professor John Langford:
There is very little respect for, or tolerance of, technocratic reports on performance. People want to hear the real-life experiences of individuals who make decisions, deliver programs and make use of the services. In my view, indicators of performance need to be more qualitative, more human, than quantitative. As the joint report put it, we need to focus on "what the real impact has been on the lives of individuals and communities." (Oct 25)

Professor James Cutt:
In terms of comprehensiveness, the information needs to deal explicitly with three levels of accountability:

• financial accountability, showing complete and accurate reporting of sources and uses of funds and some other financial information;
• accountability for compliance with the various authorities to which the program is subject. It's worth remembering that in the public sector they're essentially both procedural in nature. Since we don't sell what we produce, they say, by definition, absolutely nothing about performance in terms of results. So the third level of accountability is absolutely essential; that is,
• accountability for value for money for what we actually achieved relative to what we set out to do and how resources were used in making these achievements. This is the bit that has been missing in substance.

Value for money needs to be defined better and comprehensively enough to reflect the variety of constituencies for and perspectives on public programs. The CCAF's 12 Attributes of Effectiveness is helpful but not a panacea. It extends the traditional concept of efficiency (doing the right thing and using resources) by:

• adding appropriateness to the more specific costs and productivity; and
• adding other perspectives to outputs and outcomes under the traditional achievement of intended results, such as client acceptance, secondary impacts and the capacity and disposition of staff through a working environment.

In other words, "Have we done the right thing?" as well as "Have we done the thing right?" (Oct 25, 685)

If seemingly hard, precise quantitative information is insisted on, then managers who respond to orders will fall back on what is easy to measure rather than giving senior management a complete picture, including some information that may not be quantifiable or precise but may be needed to give the texture and context of the whole program. This can lead you to a limited or partial view of value for money, or worse, it can actually give you a perverse view. (Oct 25)

Beware of the measurement trap. Managers tend to manage to what they can measure. (Oct 25)

Some aspects of government performance, such as financial performance, are capable of being assessed on a government-wide basis (i.e. financial information is susceptible to being "rolled up" and consolidated, as is done now in the government's summary level financial statements). Consolidating the results or achievements of government programs is problematic, however, given the wide range and nature of government activities. But much of what government does transcends the activities of individual ministries and Crown corporations. This necessitates meaningful information at a higher level, at a level that crosses traditional organizational boundaries.

One way of dealing with this issue is a "sectoral" approach. Sectoral reporting means providing, in one location, summary-level information on a sectoral activity overall, with references to where additional information can be found. This would see reports, centred around major policy areas such as the environment or integrated resource management, being prepared. To do this would require that one government organization be given the lead responsibility to provide a summary-level report to the Legislative Assembly.

Sectoral reporting, however, does not address the question of who is accountable for identifying and achieving the intended results within a particular sector. No one Minister can be held accountable for achieving objectives that cross organizational lines. Nonetheless, by providing relevant and understandable information on cross-government activities, sectoral reporting can be a useful tool for informing the debate among Members of the Legislative Assembly.

More and more, governments are issuing government-wide strategic plans that set out a vision and broad goals for their citizens (such as happens in Oregon and Minnesota). These plans then become the basis for regular reporting against established targets in key areas and are made available to the Legislatures and the public.

In British Columbia, the public, through the Premier's Summits, has been involved in developing the strategic direction for the Province. In part as a result of these consultations, the government has issued annual government-wide strategic plans, setting out its priorities for the year. In turn, all ministries and Crown corporations are required to prepare strategic plans that are linked with the government's plan. These plans have not been tabled with the Legislative Assembly.

The government of Alberta, in 1994, began requiring three year business plans and budget targets for government and for all government departments and agencies. Since then, the government has issued its second overall business plan for government, entitled A Better Way II (1995/96 — 1997/98). This plan, combined with the business plans for each of the ministries, sets the direction, outlines the goals and expected results, sets the strategies to reach the goals, and identifies the measures which will be used to judge the results achieved.

The government's first annual report against this plan, Measuring Up, was issued publicly in June, 1995. This report identifies a set of 22 core measures that will be tracked over the coming years and, in this first year, provides a baseline of data and information. Every government ministry is to release its own individual annual report, detailing measures of performance tied to individual business plans. With the 1996 budget, a "watch list" of critical issues will be highlighted, the strategies to address each of the critical items outlined, targets established for the results expected and the list made public.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

Dr. Robert Evans:
The public health sector is focusing, not only on the outcomes achieved by patients, but on the health status enjoyed or not enjoyed by different BC communities. That's a much more radical step and it says that government, by generating this information, is not taking responsibility for the health of the whole community. That would be to bite off so much more than you could chew. By generating information on differentials in health status in different communities, the Provincial Health Officer is explicitly putting these issues onto the agenda and beginning to generate a kind of implicit governmental accountability for those differences. Insofar as there is government accountability, that is going to take us well beyond the boundaries of the Ministry of Health and into the ambit of a number of other ministries and well outside government. This is a responsibility for the people of the province at large, not solely for government.

Professor John Langford:
I would recommend that the committee work with the other players to sort out what kinds of comprehensive results-reporting provincial government agencies and their governmental and non-governmental partners can be expected to produce over the next five years. My advice would be to not set unrealistic targets. (Oct 25)

Crown corporations are used widely by governments across Canada. They have a considerable degree of operating autonomy and, in many cases, are engaged, to a significant extent, in commercial activities. The dual personality of Crown corporations, reflecting public policy and the commercial natures of their activities, makes them distinct from government departments as well as private sector corporations. Their nature, requiring a certain degree of independence of action, also requires a means to monitor and control the extent to which that delegation of authority is discharged.

Crown corporations in British Columbia are a key vehicle for delivering a wide range of government services. In 1993/94, Crown corporations accounted for approximately $9.5 billion in revenue; $8 billion in expenditures; $24 billion in assets; and $14 billion in public debt. However, Crown corporations are not subject to an in-depth scrutiny by the legislative committees of the House.

Various reviews of Crown corporation accountability, carried out in recent years, have concluded:

Canadian Council on Public Accounts Committees, 1992 Task Force Report on Crown Corporation Accountability (Canada-wide review ):

• the control and accountability mechanisms, including respective roles and responsibilities, are not always well defined and understood;
• the Public Accounts Committee has generally played a limited role, even though in some jurisdictions other legislative committees review Crown corporation issues and matters. The role of the PAC requires clarification;
• Legislatures, the PAC or other legislative committees, are generally not provided with adequate information related to the achievement of Crown corporation objectives.

The Canadian Council on Public Accounts Committees recommended that:

• the legislature (PAC or other legislative committees) play an important role in ensuring that-
• there is a suitable framework for Crown corporation accountability; and
• individual Crown corporations operate within the provisions of that framework.
• to assist the legislature in carrying out its role with respect to Crown corporation accountability, the legislature (or its committees) requires sufficient information on:
• the proper functioning of the overall framework; and
• individual corporate performance as it relates to achievement of objectives.

Office of the Auditor General, 1991 Annual Report:

• Crown corporations are not providing enough information to the Legislative Assembly about what they intend to achieve but also there is no requirement for them to provide such information;
• reporting on actual performance is more complete, but tends to focus on historical financial data, rather than on operational performance, and is not compared with objectives and specific operating targets; and
• non-financial information provided by the Crown corporations is often presented in an unsystematic way, making it hard for the reader to evaluate whether corporations are progressing toward their objectives.

Peat Marwick Independent Review, 1991:

• despite operational differences among Crown corporations, they are all subject to a uniform and quite limited set of government controls (p.9);
• Crown corporations are exempt from most management processes, reviews, rules and reporting requirements applicable to ministries (p.11);
• there is no requirement for Crown corporations to present information on their future plans to the Legislative Assembly; therefore, accountability for achievement of plans is seriously diminished (p.13-14);
• the major components of a management/accountability framework are:
• the Financial Administration Act generally does not apply to Crown corporations but contains several provisions that permit the Comptroller General to have access to Crown corporation information if required;
• the Financial Information Act requires only certain routine historical financial information to be prepared and made available by corporations;
• enabling Acts establishing many corporations ,generally require reporting similar to that required under the Financial Information Act, including a requirement to table the financial statements and an annual report in the Legislative Assembly. The information produced is limited. While the Public Accounts Committee can require Crown corporations to appear before it, it has not done so;
• the submission required for the Estimates, contains no information on corporate plans and has inadequate support for current appropriations; and
• annual reports, no rules as to disclosure required and few reports contain information about the achievement of corporate goals or future directions, strategies and plans. (p.11-12)

Over 70% of the annual expenditure flows from the Consolidated Revenue Fund to funded agencies in the form of transfer payments. To date, accountability for the use of these funds is expected to occur through the ministry and the Minister responsible. However, ministry annual reports seldom contain information on the results achieved by such agencies. If results-oriented performance management and accountability is to be achieved in BC, examination of the accountability relationship between government and the funded agencies is critical. This will be the subject of the next phase of the Accountability and Performance Management initiative.

EXTRACTS (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCTOBER 24 AND 25, 1995:

Dr. Robert Evans — Health Sector:
There's been an historical progression toward public accountability for the overall public budgets in the health care sector. But it hasn't been matched by a corresponding responsibility for value for money. Value for money means that you have some notion of what the outcomes are that you are purchasing with all that money. (Oct 24)

We're really seeing a kind of 50% accountability for one-half of the transaction but not for the other half. It's a problem everywhere in the developed world: governments are wrestling with the question of how they achieve some degree of accountability over the second half of the health services transaction, how they achieve some sort of influence, control would be too strong a word, over outcomes that can then be matched to the expenditures. (Oct 24)

There are three aspects to the problem of public authority in the health care sector: it is indirect, shared and contested. In other words, the notion that the public sector has authority in this area is a highly contestable proposition, and they contest it every day of the week. (Oct 24)

To illustrate, in the area of reference-based pricing of drugs, there is a contesting of the legitimacy of the provincial government to act. One argument is that it is not appropriate for the provincial government to exercise the authority of a purchaser, to decide what they will pay for. The contrary position is that it is not the responsibility or the right of government to make those kinds of decisions. Those kinds of decisions belong in the hands of the clinical community and the pharmaceutical manufacturers behind them who make the drugs, and government is exceeding its authority. It raises the question: if the provincial government does not have the right to look for accountability in this area, who does? Who is accountable for what the actual outcomes are in this sector? (Oct 24)

To achieve greater accountability in this area, government needs three things:

• information on which to make comparisons of the effects of different policies;
• a mechanism through which you can try to affect the behaviour of other participants in the sector (e.g. the mechanism of the purchaser); and
• legitimacy to carry through the policy. (Oct 24)

It would be good if hospitals were required to produce, for the public and for the Legislature, annual reports including standardized and consistent data for public consumption, defined external to the hospital, don't let them choose what they want to tell you, so that we have some basis for making those kinds of comparisons. (Oct 24)

Measures that are particularly readily comparable: measures of utilization, workload and relative cost of different types of workload in different hospitals. Make them in a form that is readily comparable, and make them available to the general public. The form to the Legislature should be an annual report. (Oct 24)

Ken Dobell — Municipal Government:
You don't have to worry (about accountability of local governments) because our affairs are structured so that we can't borrow money, except for capital purposes and with the approval of the ratepayers, which is a marvelous discipline for local government. We can't do some of the things that we would otherwise like to do. The residents see a tax bill from us twice a year, which sets it all out. They see on the street what's happening. If the street is now less well maintained, if there are more problems on the street, if it's dirtier and if the parks are not cut, they see that. They recognize it, and they deal with it. It's a very informal system, in no sense academic and elegant, but it works. (Oct 24)

Local government managers are very much aware of the need for accountability systems and the revenue limitations we have drive that, if nothing else. The City of Vancouver has a program called Better City Government, which is trying to review and redesign the processes we have to put in place. Every 18 months or so, we produce a document, called Vancouver Trends, which provides a compilation of a whole range of measures about the city of Vancouver: economic measures, parks per capita, air quality indicators, water quality indicators. It's basically 40 pages of information about how the city is doing. (Oct 24)

Is the accountability relationship of the municipality or the city with the province, and the accountability relationship of the city with the people, the electorate, clear?

Clear? No. Reasonable? Yes. Could they be better? Yes. The accountability to the province is an interesting issue. While technically, legally, the municipalities are creatures of the province, the real accountability is fairly limited. It's in compliance with the law, in the expenditure of provincial funds in some areas. The sense that the municipality is accountable to the province, as sometimes the province suggests, is not a popular concept with local governments. It would not be an issue locally. Accountability to the community for the programs that we put out, for what those programs are supposed to achieve and for whether they actually achieve it is far less than we would like to have, but it is not bad and it is improving. (Oct 24)

Jim Wright — Colleges & Institutes:
Government is becoming more of a purchaser of training that a provider of grants. It represents quite a shift, almost a paradigm shift, for our institutions because our collective agreements are structured around traditional delivery, not around responding to the expectations of employers that we train where they need the training, when they need it and under their conditions. (Oct 24)

Governments use a variety of means to purchase and deliver services within the education sector, but so far the private sector doesn't come under scrutiny; we don't have the means of looking at how they are contributing to the educational needs of workers. (MLA comment, Oct 24)

The board is an integral part of the institution, and they and the Minister are the recipients of the reports that are generated, program review reports, internal self studies and external team reports. But it's really the board that then monitors our response to the advice contained in those reports, in the recommendations. So, clearly, they are the body that is most directly responsible and affected by that process. I think it is a substantial tool for them in setting priorities for the next three-to-five year period. (Oct 24)

The Westminster Model of government is based upon the premise that government. is "accountable government" and that the mechanisms for achieving accountability are derived from the convention of ministerial responsibility. In other words, Ministers have a constitutional duty to account to Parliament or the Legislative Assembly; conversely, the Members of the Assembly have a duty to ensure that Ministers comply with this obligation. Public servants play an important role in the accountability process by assisting Ministers in keeping the Assembly informed and in the process of Legislative Assembly scrutiny of the administration of government.

The lines of accountability seem clear: public servants are accountable to Ministers; Ministers are accountable to the Legislative Assembly on an on-going basis; and the Legislative Assembly is accountable to the people by means of regular elections.

In recent years, however, as governments have become progressively larger and more complex, the principle of ministerial responsibility has become increasingly difficult to apply. There have been questions raised about the practicality of expecting Ministers to know and be held responsible for everything that goes on in their administration. At the same time, questions have been raised about the role of public servants. In some other jurisdictions, accountability mechanisms are changing, although the over-riding principle of ministerial accountability continued.

United Kingdom:
Under the United Kingdom's Next Steps initiative, many of the executive functions of government have been transferred to specially created Executive Agencies. These agencies are given greater freedom to operate within policy, resources, targets and accountability guidelines set for them by the responsible Minister. In effect, the relationship between the Minister and the CEO of an Executive Agency has become one of "management by contract".

In terms of accountability, it is the Minister responsible who answers to Parliament on the policy governing the work of the agency as well as its day-to-day operations. The CEO is accountable to the Minister for the day-to-day operations and for meeting the agreed-upon targets. Although Members of Parliament may raise any matter concerning an agency directly with the Minister responsible, they are, in fact, encouraged to communicate directly with the CEO on day-to-day matters. This arrangement was to allow Members to get more detailed replies from the CEO, who is closer to the issues than a Minister.

Under the Citizen's Charter initiative, public servants are said to be more accountable for the quality and delivery of public services. For example, local and national performance targets have been published, as well as information on the standards achieved; tougher, more independent inspectorates established; and redress provided for citizens when things go wrong. In addition to this, the annual Citizen's Charter report provides Parliament with information on the performance commitments that public service organizations have made, how these organizations have performed against the standards, and performance commitments for the future.

New Zealand:
A key aspect to the reforms in New Zealand centred on changes to the accountability relationship, splitting responsibility for policy and administration clearly between government and the heads of departments. Ministers are now said to have a "purchase" interest in the goods and services produced by government departments, as well as an "ownership" interest in the public assets.

As a purchaser, the Minister is responsible for deciding what outcomes, that is, the impacts on the community, the Minister wants to achieve and, based on policy advice, what outputs, that is, goods and services, are necessary to achieve the intended outcomes. As part of the purchase interest, the chief executive of a government department is expected to produce certain outputs as agreed to with the responsible minister.

Chief executives are accountable to the Minister for providing these goods and services within the agreed-upon price, quality, quantity and timing. (In exchange for this, departments are no longer subject to detailed cash constraints and other input controls but are given greater discretion in the way resources are acquired and used.)

Ministers are accountable, through debate and questions in Parliament, for their performance with respect to their intended outcomes. They may also be required to defend, before Parliamentary select committees, their selection of purchased outputs and the links to outcomes.

Australia:
In Australia, the convention of ministerial responsibility is affirmed: for example, Ministers are explicitly responsible for Program Performance Statements tabled in Parliament. These statements contain the outcome-oriented objectives of a program and, as such, serve as the basis for accountability for results. The statements are also used to present a case for continued funding of a program, at levels sought in the current year's budget, based on the actual results achieved. Departmental annual reports, prepared according to instructions from the Prime Minister and Cabinet, are seen as being primarily an accounting from the deputy minister of how public policy has been administered. They are examined by legislative and general purpose committees of the Senate. The House of Representatives is responsible for conducing reviews of departmental operations based on these annual reports.

For discussion regarding government objectives crossing organizational lines, see line of inquiry 2.a.i.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PAC MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

Chris Lovelace — New Zealand:
The current government set its broadly stated objectives through a process called the Path to 2010, from which flowed governmental strategic results areas. Those were the outcomes being sought by the government relative to that broad strategic direction from which departmental chief executives negotiated and agreed to key results areas, which provided the focus for the government to achieve those strategic results areas, which then in turn get driven into the purchasing arrangements in the individual performance contracts of not only the chief executives but also the individuals employed by the departments and ministries. (Oct 25)

There is a very strong link between government's strategic objectives, that is, their outcomes, and specific outputs that the department produces, and the link that binds those two together is the accountability of the chief executive, freed from rather arbitrary input controls from central agencies. So the whole emphasis is: did you do what you said you would do with the revenue that was agreed upon? (Oct 25)

The key difference in accountability between New Zealand and other jurisdictions is in the emphasis on reducing the control over inputs. The chief executive of an individual department is substantially responsible for all personnel decisions, all cash management, all capital decisions and all investment decisions related to information technology and the like. To put it in context, the State Services Commission has no policy manuals per se; they have a set of legislative guidelines and occasional statements of general policy. The Treasury, the equivalent of our Treasury Board staff, doesn't have large manuals and the Ministry of Finance. They have largely decentralized financial control and accounting responsibility, and they audit against that rather than establish the standards. (Oct 25)

When I talked about developing a funding formula (for the health sector), that was something that the department specifically could be charged with, could price, could quantify and could be measured against. Did it deliver what it said it was going to deliver? Not: did what it delivered automatically link to and achieve the government's outcomes? It's an important distinction because it puts the emphasis on who's responsible for what much more clearly in focus.

I was responsible for offering advice about what kinds of outputs would assist the government in achieving its outcomes, but I wasn't responsible for determining what those outcomes were, ultimately. That was a parliamentary accountability that only the minister could carry. . . . If circumstances changed, and if the minister said, "I have another important priority, and never mind that this is a lesser one", it would be my responsibility to negotiate a change to our purchasing agreement that would modify the terms and conditions to which I would produce that output. . . . It does change the way ministers and public servants react and the way public servants can be held accountable to committees like this. (Oct 25)

Using managerial tools and formalizing the accountability structure doesn't remove government's social obligations. It doesn't remove nuances of the political process and accountability to the public or of special interests. It does make some of that more transparent. It limits the opportunities not to be clear about your objectives. It doesn't prescribe what that objective might be. It's entirely possible for the government to change its mind, to respecify what it wants or to make judgements that are highly subjective, not objective. What it does say is that when you do that, you have to spell it out. It says that if you've asked for this set of advice, and you still want it, did you receive it? Was it of the kind and quality that you and others might objectively agree upon? Did it contribute to the kinds of outcomes that you were expecting? (Oct 25)

It's a system that doesn't allow a lot of buck-passing. That isn't to say that there aren't still opportunities for that but it occurs within a framework, so that somebody can eventually pass judgement, whether it's a citizen deciding who they're going to vote for next time or the minister trying to hold the chief executive accountable or the legislative assembly trying to decide whether the minister and the chief executive respectively have been doing their jobs. (Oct 25)

Professor John Langford:
We are in the midst of even more diffusion of responsibility for planning, decision-making and service delivery. This government is a leader in involving citizens directly in major decisions about their future through shared decision-making processes such as CORE and the devolution of planning and spending authority to community-based organizations such as regional health boards. Those kinds of developments complicate the question of holding individuals and organizations to account. (Oct 25)

Partnership arrangements with private sector organizations make it harder to reach collective agreement on anticipated results. Not only does government itself have different goals, some of them unspoken, but in creating arrangements with outsiders, governments and the outsiders have different goals; this complicates collective decision-making and delivery arrangements. (Oct 25)

It is harder to maintain the traditional insistence on upward accountability to the minister and the legislature. When in partnership with organizations in which service providers are accustomed to more direct accountability relationships with clients, the more governments partner with outside organizations, the more they're partnering essentially with organizations that tend to be accountable downward and outward rather than upward. (Oct 25)

Some of the participants in the establishment of goals really aren't very easily held to account in government, because they aren't part of government, and we're not very anxious to talk about the nature of the deal that was struck in terms of this kind of accommodative process. The nature of the solution is to get beyond trying to measure things in hard ways in relation to stated goals and to actually go out and ask the people who are affected by government's programs what they think of the results. (Oct 25)

David Schreck, MLA/John Langford:
How can government provide "transparency" when, in creating partnerships with outsiders, clarity of goals and responsibilities is not productive to the partners? (Oct 25)

In scrutinizing the performance of government, the Legislative Assembly (and the Public Accounts Committee in particular) plays a pivotal role in the accountability cycle. The Assembly does its work on behalf of the public who have conferred a responsibility both on government to manage the power and resources entrusted to it and on the Assembly in holding government to account. While, historically, citizens have relied on the Assembly to carry out the scrutiny of government, today citizens demand an increased role in the development of public policy and in the workings of their governments. Citizens' confidence in governments and their institutions in general is poor and the way that the public sector conducts its business is increasingly subject to public scrutiny. How can the Legislative Assembly give higher profile to the work that it does in the accountability cycle?

Direct accountability to client groups would entail those government organizations that have direct interface with the public, setting out specific standards of performance that a member of the public should expect when dealing with the organization.

For many citizens it is at the program level where they judge, most directly, the performance of government. This happens daily, for example, whenever people apply for a driver's licence or enter the hospital as a patient. Given this interaction with government and the public's increasing interest in accountability, should government be more directly accountable to their consumers of government services?

In the United Kingdom, the Citizen's Charter, with its emphasis on national and local performance standards in the public service, deliberately focuses management's attention on the interests of the customer. Poor performance, as defined by the consumer, has direct consequences for those who do not perform well. Patients, for example, may choose the services of another hospital, given information such as patient waiting lists. In a sense, with better information, the public have been empowered and the expected result is a better quality of service.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PAC MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

Professor John Langford:
Why is it that governments cannot re-establish the nature of that trust relationship with the public anymore? The answer is not simply that there isn't enough money anymore; there is something fundamental going on here. We've tickled people at the front end to come into government, and we've left their views out at the back end. (Oct 25)

If we don't change the way we talk about facts and get more complicated and more human about the way we talk about facts in terms of their impact on people, then we end up with this widening gap between what we say and what people experience. I think that's to the detriment of the kind of trust that people put in government. (Oct 25)

We have to connect what we're doing more to the people who are the recipients of the services that we provide. (Oct 25)

Jennifer Standeven:
How will an accountability framework affect our programming and how will it affect how we do business? The first relationship that is going to change is our relationship with the consumers of our programming, our clients. We will have to be very clear about what services we provide and what we are able to do and not do. What, then, are the dynamics in terms of what their responsibilities are as users of that service? They're not only consumers of the service but also the payers of that service, being taxpayers. (Oct 25)

Canada and many other countries are using the Internet to make key policy documents available instantly to their own citizens and to other interested parties. For example, while the Minister of Finance (Canada) was delivering his budget address, it was available, electronically, to central bankers in the other G7 countries. Similarly, within minutes of tabling the defence white paper in Parliament last year, analysts at the Pentagon in Washington (and U.S. diplomats in Ottawa) were scrutinizing the footnotes for new wrinkles in Canada's defence policy. The document was available electronically worldwide at almost the same moment that the Minister of National Defence handed the official hard copy to the clerk in the House of Commons.

This may have application in British Columbia as well. For example, supporting information to the Estimates (for example, strategic and business plans) or detailed reports on the performance of government organizations could be made available electronically. This may allow for a summary of key accountability documents to be provided in hard copy with access to detailed, supporting data available in electronic form. Electronic reporting might also help bridge the links between various accountability documents (such as the Estimates and ministry plans and performance reports) and possibly reduce duplication in information.

Such a database would, however, need to be designed and maintained and its integrity assured. Key users (for example, MLAs) would need to have easy access.

Increasingly, governments are describing their results in terms of outcomes. Many jurisdictions, where public sector management reform is underway, consider outcomes the ultimate expression of a government's intent. Outcomes, such as providing clean water, are of interest to legislators and the public alike for they are a way of describing the real impact that a government has had on the lives of its citizens.

Defining and measuring outcomes, however, is seldom easy. It requires a clear understanding, at the outset, of the objectives or results expected from a program; although these objectives may be found in statutes, directives, strategic plans or other documents of government, they may not be clearly understood. In fact, government programs may have multiple and conflicting objectives. Is a government's primary objective, for example, to operate programs in a way that promotes efficiency or is it to provide equal access to services to as many citizens as possible? Even across government, the policy objectives of one public sector organization may, in some ways, contradict the objectives of another. Encouraging a healthy timber processing industry, for instances, may conflict with the objective of managing, protecting and enhancing the environment.

Measuring outcomes is critical it knowing how well a government has met its objectives for improving the quality of life of its citizens. Developing outcome measures, though, can be difficult and contentious, in part because the link between program activities and program benefits is sometimes tenuous. Measuring an outcome may require time-consuming and costly processes, such as surveys, and could involve following program beneficiaries long after they have left the program. In light of this, less direct indicators, such as outputs, can serve as an intermediate measure of results. Nonetheless, it is on the basis of results, that is, the outcomes, that the legislators and the public ultimately judge the success of government programs.

One possible approach is to establish a cyclical reporting requirement for outcomes.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PAC MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
A difficulty is in relating what's actually being done within the time frames it is being done in. Accountability performance reporting systems sometimes offer indicators that change only on a generational basis (i.e. we may only know the outcome in 20 years) and aren't, necessarily, directly and immediately influenced by what the government is doing. These indicators are held out as measures of the performance of the current governing body, which clearly is not very meaningful. (Oct 24)

Harry Hatry:
An important limitation of outcome data is that it will tell what has happened, not why it has happened.

Ongoing, regular performance measurement is not equally applicable to all types of programs. Programs such as research, whose major, predominant outcomes will not occur for many years, are not likely to generate useful, annual outcome measurements. The best that can be done is to track program outputs and a few quality characteristics, for example, whether work is completed on time or the number of citations in professional journals. However, such data are quite limited in their usefulness to public officials. (Oct 25)

Professor John Langford:
It's not possible to imagine a government accountability system that provides comprehensive assessments of the performance of all programs on a cyclical basis. Governments and their partners don't have the resources or the capacity to prepare such reports or manage an accountability system of such complexity. I think all the stakeholders, legislators, ministers, managers, contractors and partners, need to enter more seriously into a dialogue about what evaluation and reporting activities can realistically be taken on by the BC government and its private sector accomplices in the contemporary context of declining resources. (Oct 25)

A major problem [in the cycle and timing of accountability reports] is that ministry budgets are approved on an annual basis after the year has already started, but before results are available for the previous year. Procedures must be in place to ensure prompter reporting, both on an interim and an annual basis, at the program level. Ministry annual reports are required by legislation and could be the appropriate medium for the accountability report. Over time, the form of the report itself will develop with experience. This could also change the format and focus of the annual public accounts. (Extract from Getting Results, Fred Gingell, CA Magazine)

Currently, however, annual reports, are usually tabled late and, consequently, are of limited use for accountability purposes. Even if the reports were provided within three months of the fiscal year end, they would still be too late to be of use during Estimates debates.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS — OCT 24-25, 1995:

Professor James Cutt:
For completeness and context, the information needs to reflect the management cycle of activities in government, beginning with purposes and targets, financial and other, which establish the accountability terms of reference (or the marching orders) for the program for the year. You move on through progress, modification and monitoring over the year and culminate in a comprehensive end-of-year picture that, consistent with these original marching orders, succinctly captures the moving picture of the year using headings such as:

• why we exist;
• where we fit in the ministry and government;
• what we set out to achieve and how we set out to do it;
• how we managed our affairs and kept an eye on things;
• whether we actually achieved our accountability record; and
• self-analysis and recommendations for proposed action by managers and senior management.

I see accountability as comprehensive in the sense of a seamless web from intentions to achievements across the management cycle. (Oct 25)

Earlier initiatives failed in part because they were limited to only one part of the management cycle. Program budgeting and zero-based budgeting emphasized elaborate justification of budgets but then neglected any follow-up in monitoring and reporting. In a sense, value for money has stressed the at-the-end-of-the-day picture without good front-end terms of reference. (Oct 25)

Professor John Langford:
I would recommend that the committee go beyond ministers and deputies, and invite lower-level administrators, service-deliverers, both public and private, clients and other affected citizens to discuss the program or activity from their perspective. Put a human face on accountability or it is my sense that the public will continue to look to the medial to tell them whether the money is being spent wisely. (Oct 25)

As broader accountability information is produced, the quality of the information that is reported, and the appropriateness, completeness and accuracy of the measures used will require independent verification.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
There is a need for some form of assurance about the information that's reported to the Legislature and the public. A validation mechanism is essential; what gets audited, gets respected. What validation and audit do is impose a completeness test: to match what's being reported to a completeness test that's been agreed to and see whether the information stacks up against it. One model for audit is the auditor attesting to management's representations on performance. (Oct 24)

Professor James Cutt:
Use an analytical group within government, and most appropriately within the office of the comptroller-general, to establish analytical standards to indicate the various levels and types of analysis, to indicate the degree of assurance that can be attributed to the various approaches and to provide verification of analytical documentation and therefore assurance to senior managers and ministers. (Oct 25)

Is it appropriate for government and its public sector managers (albeit through a public consultation process) to establish the performance measures by which government should be judged or should the Legislative Assembly have an oversight role in this? A further consideration is the extent to which stakeholders should be involved in deciding what are the appropriate measures of performance. Some jurisdictions, such as Oregon, Minnesota and Alberta, have invited specific public input with respect to identifying key measures of performance.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS — OCT 24-25, 1995

Harry Hatry:
Congress should review the performance indicators contained in the early program performance plans and look for important omissions. Congress should also examine performance indicators contained in agency Strategic Plans, particularly since the Government Performance and Results Act requires federal agencies to consult with Congress in developing agency strategic plans.

While political issues can work against early cooperation on the selection of performance indicators, this should be attempted. This will give Congress the opportunity to encourage the Executive Branch to cover outcomes that Congress believe are important that otherwise would not be included. (Oct 25)

Professor John Langford:
When you start with a Premier's Summit or a CORE table or a Forest Renewal collective, where everybody is sitting around the table . . . we need to come back to that initial collective to say, "So how did it stack up?" and do it as a collective. (Oct 25)

In our efforts to provide complete and meaningful information to the Legislative Assembly, there is some concern that we not confuse data with management information. While Oregon is considered a leader in performance measuring, its report to the Legislature does raise the issue of detail. For example, the most recent Oregon Benchmarks Report to the Legislature contains data on 259 benchmarks for the three key areas of its strategic plan (exceptional people, quality of life and a diverse, robust economy) as well as explanatory notes supporting the data. Is accountability well served by such detail? What does it all mean to those who receive this information?

A different, perhaps simpler, approach has been taken in the United Kingdom in reporting on its Citizens Charter. The government's report to Parliament identifies, in clear language, what it promised, what it has done and its future commitments for its areas of responsibility (e.g. health, employment or housing). More detailed information is available in the individual reports of the organizations.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
We should not take the view that all information needs are equal at every level. There are significant differences between the information means and reporting responsibilities of a governing body and of its executive, of its public servants and, within that, at different levels. One problem is the notion that all you have to do is start rolling information up from the bottom, that you will know everything you need to know about the effectiveness of the quality of your services and programs. That's just not true. (Oct 24)

There is no single defining characteristic of what constitutes a good performance measure. What characterizes information and distinguishes it from data is when the information explains the choices that remain, why those choices remain and what the consequences were or what they were expected to be. Performance measures have to address the trade-offs and choices and be revealing in the context of why something was done and why it was done in the way it was. (Oct 24)

Professor James Cutt:
Insist on as complete a picture as possible, recognizing that some of the information may be pretty loosey-goosey. It's always better to be approximately right rather than precisely wrong.

If you produce information from data, then the audit trail from the data to the information should be clear and reassurance given to you that, in fact, the use that has been made of that data, the analytical method used to arrive at the conclusions, is reliable. But I think the demand for access to data is limited. The real demand, particularly from elected politicians and senior managers in the public sector, is for heavily predigested, very succinct information. (Oct 25)

The pith and substance of an accountability statement at any stage of the cycle should be clear and accessible on a quick overview. (Oct 25)

The legislative or select standing committee has the potential to be a key instrument through which the Legislative Assembly can scrutinize the performance of government. Legislative committees are struck to provide for a more thorough examination of matters than is possible if the Assembly had to deal with everything itself.

In BC, legislative committees are appointed but not necessarily convened. The most active legislative committee in BC is the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts; by contrast, the Select Standing Committee on Finance, Crown Corporations and Government Services has not met in several years. (Perhaps one consequence of this is that the performance of Crown corporations has largely remained outside the detailed scrutiny of the Legislative Assembly.) Perhaps consideration should be given to regularly convening other legislative committees to help review the performance of the government's ministries and Crown corporations.

Another issue to consider is whether the time available to legislative committees, such as the Public Accounts Committee, with respect to their accountability function is adequate. Unlike most jurisdictions in Canada, the Public Accounts Committee can meet only while the Legislative Assembly is in session. (Although the Committee is presently meeting out of session, it is not clear that this will be a continuing practice.) This means that in recent years, the Committee has had, on average, only 17 hours per session in which to review, in detail, the public accounts and the reports of the Auditor General. While the Auditor General has moved to periodic reporting, this may be of little value to the Committee if it cannot meet at any time and receive reports without the formality of tabling them.

The role of the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts was the subject of detailed review by the Canadian Council of Public Accounts Committees in 1988. It developed guidelines of a model public accounts committee in Canada and, in 1991, assessed the extent to which these guidelines, and those offered by the Canadian Comprehensive Auditing Foundation, were followed across Canada. Little appears to have changed in BC since the report was issued; many of the Council's observations still hold true today.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
Information to support decision-making in public accountability is, in fact, information to support effective governance. That's the context for the information; that's why the information is needed. The way in which the Legislature and the executive define their government's responsibilities and those of their public servants impacts the information and accountability reporting issues. It's very hard to define what kind of accountability you want and what kind of information you want to pass on if there is no consensus or view of what your own responsibilities are. (Oct 24)

Professor John Langford:
I would insist that reporting be in plain language and that the committee indicate publicly when reporting is inadequate. (Oct 25)

I would ask that the committee show leadership in terms of a results orientation by focusing the activities of the committee, in terms of scrutiny, on a small number of programs each year. (Oct 25)

Generally, neither the Public Accounts Committee nor the Committee on Finance, Crown Corporations and Government Services have reviewed the budgets, corporate plans or other reports of Crown corporations. Similarly, the activities of funded agencies largely remain outside the detailed scrutiny of the Legislative Assembly. While it may not be practical to assess the performance of all ministries and Crown corporations within a reasonable time frame, priority could be given to particular government organizations. It may be that a sectoral, rather than organizational, approach would be of value in reviewing government's performance.

The strategic/business plans and annual reports of ministries and Crown corporations are not referred to the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts or any other legislative committee. Unless an issue is raised in a report of the Auditor General or by a Member of PAC (as it pertains to the Province's Public Accounts), government operations do not receive legislative committee scrutiny. To allow a comparison of government intentions and results, it may be desirable to have the financial and operational plans as well as the annual reports of ministries and Crown corporations automatically referred to legislative committees.

Legislative committees are confined, by their terms of reference, to discussing only those matters referred by the Legislative Assembly. For the Public Accounts Committee, these matters have included the Public Accounts of British Columbia, the Auditor General's annual and periodic reports, and applications for the retention and disposal of government documents. (The Committee cannot address the review of other expenditures of government, such as transfer payments and tax expenditures.) The Committee can neither direct the work of the Auditor General nor request the House to refer a particular matter to it. Finally, there is no provision in BC, as there is in many jurisdictions in Canada, for the automatic referral of key accountability documents, such as the annual reports of government organizations.

Should the results-focused accountability framework be enshrined in legislation (individual legislation for each government organization, or specific accountability legislation) or secured by other means (e.g., government directive)?

Generally, ministries and Crown corporations receive little direction as to what they are accountable for. Legislation for most ministries simply calls for an annual report on the operations of the organization, no detail is provided as to content. A notable exception is the Ministry of Forests. Its legislation specifically calls for the Minister, every ten years, to lay before the Assembly a forest and range resource analysis and, every year to lay before the Assembly a five-year resource program. As well, the Minister is to submit an annual report of the work performed by the ministry, including detailed information about the forest and range program and a summary of the state of forest land in the Province.

Recent legislation, assented to in 1993, may allow legislators and the public to assess the performance of the Office of the Public Guardian and Trustee. It calls for a three year service delivery plan and an annual report of the extent to which the Office has met the performance targets and other objectives contained in the service delivery plan. The accountability provisions contained in this legislation have not yet been proclaimed.

Most other jurisdictions do explicitly define, through legislation, the accountability requirements of government organizations and, in some cases, of government as a whole. The nature and specificity of the legislation varies, of course, from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. In the United Kingdom, for example, much of the reform has been carried out through administrative policy, rather than legislation. To the other end of the scale, New Zealand's reforms were very much driven at the front end by legislation. In the United States, the federal Government Performance and Results Act has set out specific requirements to be phased in, and evaluated, over a multi-year period. Closer to home, the Government Accountability Act of Alberta, for instance, requires a consolidated financial plan, business plan and annual report for the Province. The annual report must include:

• consolidated financial statements;
• a comparison of actual performance results and desired results included in the business plan; and
• an overview of results achieved in the government's core businesses. Similarly, ministries must prepare and make public their business plans and annual reports. These documents must include the same type of information that is included in a consolidated business plan and annual report for government.

Issues for consideration with respect to creating legislation for accountability requirements include: * should it be introduced at the front end, to help drive change, or should it be introduced later, to capture best practice? * should it be of a general or specific nature?

Legislating public accountability standards for reporting on results achieved can both signal a legislature's interest in performance and serve to motivate managers to pursue changes they might otherwise not pursue. However, many agree that simply passing laws is not enough. If government, and perhaps the legislature in general, are not committed to the changes sought through legislation, they may not gain the widespread support of its public sector management.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PAC MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
If the governing body places value on a broader kind of performance information, it's going to have to express its will in a sufficiently forceful way. Legislation is an important signal to public servants and the community and provides for a continuity that is difficult to break down over time. (Oct 24)

Professor James Cutt:
Don't rush. Recognize the differential applicability of the information requirements across government and be very flexible within the general comprehensive framework. Critically, be very cautious about proceeding to legislation, other than in very general framework terms. Locking all the areas into a framework before testing its differential applicability would be the surest way of guaranteeing compliance with form rather than substance and guaranteeing the failure of the initiative. (Oct 25)

Harry Hatry:
Congress should resist the temptation to insert into future legislation specific performance indicators, including numerical targets. There may be rare occasions when it may be appropriate to do so, such as when the Executive Branch has failed to cover some important outcomes; however, the problems of data collection remain significant. Furthermore, Congress will seldom have the opportunity to explore all the technical and other issues involved with including particular performance indicators.

However, Congress might want to identify in legislation, certain outcomes (but not the specific indicators for measuring those outcomes) that, at a minimum, it wants covered by performance data. (Oct 25)

How can we encourage a culture of performance so that the focus of government's effort is on results and accountability for those results?

Underlying public sector reforms in other jurisdictions was the need to encourage a culture of performance. By setting performance targets, measuring results, and linking consequences to performance, managers have gradually come to think in terms of outcomes rather than inputs and outputs. For example, as part of the Next Steps initiative in the United Kingdom, measurable goals for program performance are part of the employment contract for agency heads; in return for meeting these goals, the agency heads are given greater freedom in how their resources are spent. The Citizen's Charter, with its emphasis on performance standards in the public service, deliberately focuses management's attention on the interests of the customer. Poor performance, as defined by the consumer, has direct consequences for those who do not perform well. Patients, for example, may choose the services of another hospital, given information such as patient waiting lists. In the long run, public sector organizations that lose their market may also lose their funding.

In Australia and the United Kingdom, experience has shown that greater flexibility in managing seems to increase the likelihood that performance measures will be used. Based on this, the USA has relaxed central agency constraints in the areas of personnel, budget and procurement for five of its agencies as part of a two-year project. The expectation is that managers will be more concerned with meeting performance targets than ensuring they comply with a set of strict rules and regulations.

Incentives from the private sector, such as performance-related pay and performance agreements, have also been used to focus management's efforts on the achievement of results. In the United Kingdom, the remuneration of the CEO of an agency is linked to the achievement of key performance targets. In New Zealand, each CEO signs a performance agreements, specifying the personal contribution expected of him or her.

Bringing about a focus on results can take time. The USA has recognized this and has taken a slow and cautious approach to implementing its Government Performance and Results Act. The Act provides checkpoints so that Congress can review the results of the pilot projects before authorizing full implementation. As government has pointed out, the "ultimate objective is to change agency and managerial behaviour, not to create another bureaucratic system." Along with this change, the public must exercise some tolerance for errors as managers learn to adapt to a new way of managing. This tolerance may be difficult to gain, given the high standards of behaviour and performance that the public has come to expect. Nonetheless, it is critical if the public sector is to increasingly manage and account for results.

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PAC MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

J-P Boisclair:
Don't form the view that you need 100% perfection tomorrow morning. These things improve the more you do them and a plan that recognizes that is one of the most important things a governing body can do to move this agenda forward. (Oct 24)

It is by leadership that we convince public servants to be part of the process. Demonstrate that information will be used fairly, constructively and positively in the system. A demand on the part of the governing body that the quality of the accountability reporting by its public servants counts in their career and in the performance appraisal, etc. at the highest possible levels would assist. (Oct 24)

Professor John Langford:
I would recommend that the committee make sure that appropriate resources and training are built into plans to implement new performance measurement systems at the ministry and agency level. In the end, it is my belief that the capacity, commitment and skill of government organizations and their private partners are really crucial variables. Other than that, you're really just worrying about finding ways of holding people accountable for the ways in which they hold themselves accountable. There's this sort of never-ending cycle of wanting to scrutinize and check people. If they aren't really working at the highest level of professionalism and commitment to this process, it really won't be a meaningful process. (Oct 25)

Professor James Cutt:
A vital part of public sector reforms is how they are viewed by the people who provide information to program managers. There has to be some point in it, some real consequences of a rational nature, where good performance is rewarded and bad performance is questioned. If the information is not used properly, managers will give you lousy information or not information at all. They will note that giving good information amounts to indecent disclosure, and they will revert to the smokescreen. So it's critical that you associate this with a rational and predictable framework of incentives for front-line managers in the proposed new system. (Oct 25)

An important asset and attribute of the framework you're looking at is that it invites managers themselves to use their expertise in providing accountability information. (Oct 25)

The information you'll get in any accountability system is only as good as the public servants who prepare it and those who monitor it. So the professionalism, objectivity, morale and enthusiasm of the public service is an absolutely critical ingredient of success. . . . The system will only work if you honour and reward the professional, objective public servant. (Oct 25)

Gary Hartwig:
Human nature is resistant to change. There is an operating culture within the public service which focuses more on the risk-aversion side than the risk-taking. That is not necessarily bad but when we move to greater accountability, there will be some apprehension about that. There may have to be an element of sales considered in how this initiative is implemented.

Having said that, I think you would be surprised at the level of willingness and buy-in that you would find within the public sector for initiatives like this. People want to contribute in meaningful ways in their work, and this is one way of achieving or measuring those meaningful ways with different yardsticks. The other side of it is that civil servants are taxpayers and enhanced accountability and performance is something that everyone really wants, in the end. (Oct 25)

In British Columbia, in debating specific appropriations, Members of the Opposition can question the direction of programs within each ministry as well as the funds that are required. This debate tends to focus on input issues of estimated spending and staffing, less so on the results or outcomes that government programs are intended to achieve. Reforming the Estimates debate so that legislators can more effectively discuss the intended results or outcomes of government programs would require a fundamental reform. The Estimates document itself, for example, does not focus on program objectives; consequently, legislators are unable to compare the actual achievements of the executive government against its promised results.

Planning (a key element of managing for results) and identifying the achievement of results (i.e. intended outcomes) encourages a multi-year view of government operations. The annual appropriation process, however, reflects a one-year view. Forward looking information covering a longer time-span than one year would provide more context for the annual appropriation process. (Some jurisdictions require planning information to cover a three year period, the Estimates year plus two more.)

EXTRACT (PARAPHRASED) FROM PUBLIC ACCOUNTS COMMITTEE MEETINGS, OCT 24-25, 1995:

Professor James Cutt:
There is no parallel system to PAC for examination of and debate on the estimates and budget documents. Consequently, governments are free to take liberties with the quality and quantity of information they provide. I propose extending the mandate of the Auditor General in two ways:

• first, to deal more broadly with program effectiveness, as reflected in the CCAF attributes; and
• second, to deal with the estimates and budget documents, including the analytical documentation supporting budgetary decisions.

Also, set up a new select standing committee on the estimates and budget which would examine, from the perspective of the Legislative Assembly, the documentation on government intentions in the budgets and estimates and coordinate the work of the committee with yours. Both committees in this system would be served by the Auditor General, and the Legislative Assembly and the public would have the assurance, provided by the Auditor General, on the completeness and accuracy of information provided at the beginning of the year as well as at the end. (Oct 25)

Chris Lovelace — New Zealand:
There has been a conscious attempt to make those estimates easier to understand, make the ministerial objectives clearer, make departmental performance more explicit and establish a better link between the estimates and the economic update statements. I'm not sure if they succeeded in making it easier, given the size of the documents, but they certainly have made the process more transparent.

There is an explicit and legally binding requirement for the budget cycle, including:

• half-yearly and yearly statements;
• a budget policy statement three months in advance of the actual tabling of the budget; and
• a whole variety of disclosure documents, including —
• the pre-election economic and fiscal update, in effect, an auditable statement of the state of the government's finances in advance of the election writ being dropped. The intention was to minimize arguments around what the state of the government's fiscal position was and what the state of the general economy was in advance of an election.

The budget policy statement attempts to specify both the broad strategic priorities and the long-term fiscal objectives for the country, and it explains the consistency of the objectives and the principles. It also outlines, in detail, the government's fiscal intentions over the coming years. The whole of that document is referred to the parliamentary Select Committee on Finance for its review and debate. In fact, the committee is entitled to hold hearings on that.

Economic and fiscal updates are issued regularly, and they contain accrual forecasts for the next three fiscal years. They also include all government decisions in all other circumstances that look to have a material, economic and fiscal impact on those, and they attempt to quantify decisions and circumstances. Where they can't be quantified, they identify potential fiscal risks. The appropriation process itself is intended to be based on the purchase of outputs rather than on the funding of inputs. It's divided into a statement of the vote or the minister's objectives, the appropriation requests and descriptions of each of those, detailed descriptions of the Crown revenue flows and reconciliation with any changes made between one year and the next in terms of accounting principles or reporting principles or vote structures, and the like. (Oct 25)

Appendix C

ACCOUNTABILITY AND PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT

Reference Sources

1.   ACCOUNTABILITY

Asian Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions, Tokyo Declaration of Guidelines on Public Accountability, 1985

Canadian Study of Parliament Group, Accountability Committees and Parliament, May 19, 1993

Canadian Council of Public Accounts Committees, Task Force Report on Crown Corporation Accountability, July, 1992

Canadian Council of Public Accounts Committees, Task Force Follow-Up Report on Crown Corporation Accountability, July, 1993

L. Denis Desautels, Auditor General of Canada, Reflections on Ethics and Accountability, notes or an address delivered at Athabaska University in Calgary, July, 1994

S. L. Sutherland, The Al Mashat Affair: Administrative Accountability in Parliamentary Institutions, in Canadian Public Administration, Winter, 1991

K. Kernaghan and J.W. Langford, The Responsible Public Servant, 1990

G. Osbaldeston, Accountability: Do We Need to Change Our System of Accountability for Deputy Ministers? in a speech to The Planning Forum, Ottawa, June 8, 1987

P. Greer, Parliamentary and Public Accountability, in Transforming Central Government: The Next Steps Initiative, 1994

Jack A. Brizius and Michael D. Campbell, Getting Results: A Guide for Government Accountability, Council of Governors' Policy Advisors, 1991

2.   PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT

Crown Corporations Secretariat, Ministry of Employment & Investment, Guidelines for Crown Corporations for the Preparation of Strategic and Business Plans, March 16, 1994

U.S. General Accounting Office, Managing for Results: Experiences Abroad Suggest Insights for Federal Management Reforms, May, 1995

U.S. General Accounting Office, Managing for Results: Steps for Strengthening Federal Management, May 9, 1995

U.S. General Accounting Office, Performance Budgeting: State Experiences and Implications for the Federal Government, February, 1993

National Governors' Association, An Action Agenda to Redesign State Government, 1993
Executive Agencies: A Guide to Setting Targets and Measuring Performance, HM Treasury, UK, 1992 Paul D. Epstein, Get Ready: The Time for Performance Measurement is Finally Coming! in Public Administration Review, September/October, 1992, Vol. 52, No. 5

National Audit Office, Performance Measurement in the Civil Service: Experience in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, HM Customs & Excise and Department of Education and Science, May 3, 1991

3.   PUBLIC SECTOR REFORM IN OTHER JURISDICTIONS

CANADA:

Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, New Directions: Departmental Business Plans and Outlooks, March, 1995

Treasury Board Secretariat, Results-Based Management and Accountability (draft), August 11, 1994

Office of the Auditor General, Public Service 2000 ... Developing a Common Understanding, August, 1991

Office of the Auditor General, Public Service 2000 ... A Current View, January, 1992

Paul Tellier, It's Time to Re-engineer the Public Service, excerpts taken from his speech to the Canadian Institute in Ottawa, 1994

ALBERTA:

Chapter G-5.5, Government Accountability Act, 1995, The Legislative Assembly of Alberta, assented to May 17, 1995

Government of Alberta, A Better Way: A Blueprint for Building Alberta's Future, 1995/96-1997/98, February 21, 1995

Alberta Legislature, Office of the Auditor General, Government Accountability, April 12, 1994

Report to Albertans on A Financial Plan for Alberta, Public Accounts, 1993-94, Overview Volume 1,

Government of Alberta, Measuring Up, December, 1994

Government of Alberta, Measuring Up: First Annual Report by the Government of Alberta, June, 1995

NEW BRUNSWICK:

New Brunswick Office of the Auditor General, Report of the Auditor General, December, 1994

Government of New Brunswick, Service Quality Initiative, 1995

Performance Management in the New Brunswick Public Sector, prepared for the Deputy Ministers' Committee on Executive Development by the working committee on Performance Management, December, 1993

NOVA SCOTIA:

Nova Scotia Department of Finance, Government By Design, 1995-96, Progress and Challenge

AUSTRALIA:

Agenda for Reform, Report of the Independent Commission to Review Public Sector Finances, Western Australia, June, 1993

Government of Western Australia, Managing for Balance: A Public Sector Management Strategy, August, 1992

Not Dollars Alone: Review of the Financial Management Improvement Program, Report of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Finance and Public Administration, September, 1990

Commission on Accountability, Report to the Premier, January, 1989

NEW ZEALAND:

Public Finance Act, 1989, No. 44

Brian McCulloch, New Zealand Leads in Government Management Reform in Government Accountants Journal, Spring, 1993

Graham Scott and Ian Ball, Financial Management Reform in the New Zealand Government, April, 1993

Office of the Auditor General of Canada, Toward Better Governance: Public Service Reform in New Zealand (1984-1994) and its Relevance to Canada, Minister of Supply and Services, 1995

UNITED KINGDOM:

Next Steps Review 1994: Agencies in Government, Presented to Parliament, December, 1994

Next Steps Agencies: Annual Reports and Accounts, February, 1993

The Department of Education and Science, Teachers' Pensions Agency Framework Document, April 1, 1992

The Efficiency Unit, Making the Most of Next Steps: The Management of Ministers' Departments and their Executive Agencies, Report to the Prime Minister, May, 1991.

The Citizen's Charter: Raising the Standard, presented to Parliament by the Prime Minister, July, 1991

The Citizen's Charter, Second Report: 1994, presented to Parliament by the Prime Minister, March, 1994

Department for Education, The Charter for Further Education, 1993

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:

Vice President Al Gore, From Red Tape to Results: Creating a Government That Works Better and Costs Less, Report of the National Performance Review, September 7, 1993

Vice President Al Gore, Creating a Government That Works Better and Costs Less: Status Report, Report of the National Performance Review, September 14, 1994

Report of the Committee on Governmental Affairs, United States Senate, Government Performance and Results Act, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, September 29, 1992

Governmental Accounting Standards Board, Service Efforts and Accomplishments Reporting: Its Time Has Come, 1990

FLORIDA:

Florida Statute 187.201, State Comprehensive Plan, October 1, 1994

Constitution of the State of Florida, Article III, Section 19, State Budgeting, Planning and Appropriations Processes, 1993

Florida Commission on Government Accountability to the People, Annual Report 1992-93, November, 1993

OREGON:

Governor of Oregon, Oregon Shines: An Economic Strategy for the Pacific Century (Summary), Oregon Economic Development Department, May, 1989

Senate Bill 1130 (An Act Relating to Government Productivity), Oregon Laws, 1993 Session

Oregon Progress Board, Oregon Benchmarks — Standards for Measuring Statewide Progress and Institutional Performance, Report to the 1995 Legislature, December 1994

Harry P. Hatry and John J. Kirlin, An Assessment of the Oregon Benchmarks: A Report to the Oregon Progress Board, June, 1994

MINNESOTA:

Chapter #192, S.F. #1620, Performance Reporting for Agencies of State Government, Extract, undated

MN Planning, Minnesota Milestones: A Report Card for the Future, December, 1992

Minnesota Planning, Minnesota Milestones: 1993 Progress Report, May, 1994

Laura M. King, Operating and Capital Budget Reform in Minnesota: Managing Public Finances Like The Future Matters, Government Finance Review, February, 1995

TEXAS:

Strategic Planning and Budgeting in the "New Texas": Putting Service Efforts and Accomplishments to Work, International Journal of Public Administration, 1995

Texas State Audit Office, The Bottom Line: A Biennial Report on Accountability, January, 1993

Budget and Planning Office of the Governor, Strategic Budgeting in Texas: A New System for the 90s, undated

State Auditor's Office, How Far Can We Go? Measuring Performance in Government, in Action Alert, September 21, 1992

Appendix D

SUPPORTING DOCUMENTATION

The following are the documents received and examined by the Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts over the period September to January 1996:

Action alert
AirCare: Making a Clear Difference
Assessment of the Oregon Benchmarks

Canadian Comprehensive Auditing Foundation: Working Together to Improve Accountability (Vancouver, October 29-30, 1995 conference brochure)
Citizen Surveys: Special Report (book)
Citizen's Charter: Not All Bad News
Citizen's Charter: Raising the Standard
Civil Service: Taking Forward Continuity and Change
Crown Corporation Accountability: reporting on performance

Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector, June, 1995 (report of the Auditor General and Deputy Minister's Council, Province of British Columbia)
Enhancing Accountability for Performance in the British Columbia Public Sector: Committee Lines of Inquiry
Experience of Other Jurisdictions
Evolution of Accountability for Results

Governance Information Checkup
Government by Design
Government by Design: 1995/96 Progress and Challenge

If the Economy is Up, Why is American Down?
Information for Effective Governance and Accountability

Key Points of Witnesses: October 25, 1995

Managing for Results: Advancing the Art of Performance Measurement (conference information kit)
Managing for Results: Advancing the Art of Performance Measurement (selected conference proceedings, Austin, Texas; November 1-3, 1995 [six audio tapes ])
  – Strategic Planning and Performance Budgeting in Texas
  – Performance Measurement Software
  – Systems or People?
  – Citizen Surveys
  – Arizona's Budget Reform Act of 1994

Measuring Up: First Annual Report of the Government of Alberta, June, 1995
Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food:
  – 1995/96 Business Plan
  – 1995/96 Business Planning Guidelines
  – presentation to the Committee
Ministry of Transportation and Highways:
  – Oak Street Bridge Rehabilitation Project — lower mainland electoral district
  – Performance measures: An Introduction and An Example — Strategic Management 1995-1996
  – Strategic Management Framework: Guidelines for Management Planning — Strategic Management 1995-1996

Overview of Quality and Affordable Service for Canadians: establishing service standards in the Federal Government

Patient's Charter and You; a charter for England
Performance reporting requirements of BC Hydro (draft)
Portland City Survey (1991, 1992, 1995)
Presentation by Ken Dobell
Public Servant Quality: An Issue Worthy of Pursuit

Reference Sources
Report to Citizens (Portland, Oregon)

Select Standing Committee on Public Accounts Press Release, August 8, 1995

Testimony of Harry P. Hatry on Performance Measurement, Benchmarking and Re-engineering, originally presented to the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight (U.S.)

United Kingdom's Citizen's Charter

Appendix E

FINANCIAL ADMINISTRATION ACT

(excerpts -including for information only)

Appendix F

*In Ontario, Westminister, and Western Australia, not all ministries' estimates may be debated. In Ontario, those not debated are deemed to have passed, while in Westminister and Western Australia, those not debated must still be voted upon.

Appendix G

MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS

#1

Tuesday, September 12, 1995
Douglas Fir Committee Room (226)
Parliament Buildings Victoria 10:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. L. Krog, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Mr. J. Beattie, MLA; Ms. J. Pullinger, MLA; Mr. L. Reid, MLA; Ms. L. Stephens, MLA.

Observer
Mr. Gordon Wilson, MLA

Officials
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

#2

Tuesday, October 24, 1995
Grand Ballroom A
Delta Pacific Resort and Conference Centre
Richmond, BC
10:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. L. Krog, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Mr. J. Beattie, MLA; Ms. J. Pullinger, MLA; Ms. L. Reid, MLA; Ms. L. Stephens, MLA; Mr. L. Fox, MLA.

Officials
Mr. George Morfitt, FCA
Auditor General
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

#3

Wednesday, October 25, 1995
Douglas Fir Committee Room (224)
Parliament Buildings
10:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. L. Krog, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Mr. J. Beattie, MLA; Ms. J. Pullinger, MLA; Ms. L. Reid, MLA; Ms. L. Stephens, MLA; Mr. L. Fox, MLA.

Officials
Mr. George Morfitt, FCA
Auditor General
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

#4

Thursday, November 23, 1995
Douglas Fir Committee Room (224)
Parliament Buildings
10:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Mr. Jim Beattie, MLA; Ms. L. Reid, MLA.

Officials
Mr. George Morfitt, FCA
Auditor General
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

#5

Thursday, November 30, 1995
Douglas Fir Committee Room (224)
Parliament Buildings
10:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. L. Krog, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Ms. L. Reid, MLA; Mr. L. Fox, MLA.

Officials
Mr. George Morfitt, FCA
Auditor General
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

#6

Wednesday, January 31, 1996
Douglas Fir Committee Room (224)
Parliament Buildings
9:00 a.m.

MINUTES

Present:
Mr. F. Gingell, MLA (Chairperson);
Ms. A. Hagen, MLA (Deputy Chairperson);
Mr. Jim Beattie, MLA; Mr. M. Farnworth, MLA; Mr. D. Schreck, MLA; Mr. R. Kasper, MLA; Ms. L. Reid, MLA; Ms. L. Stephens, MLA; Mr. L. Fox, MLA.

Officials
Mr. George Morfitt, FCA
Auditor General
Mr. Alan Barnard, CMA
Comptroller General

Advisors
Mr. Errol Price
Senior Principal, Office of the Auditor General
Mr. Michael Costello, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Finance and Corporate Relations
Mr. Chris Trumpy, Assistant Deputy Minister, Provincial Treasury