Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Our committee has been through the Auditor General's report and had some serious concerns, but I think the one thing we keep coming back to is that the concerns we are expressing this year are not new. These are not revelations, as it were. There have been problems in various areas that seem to be ongoing and you can track these things back through many years, so I think it really begs the question as to whether when the government actually speaks to these issues, they really intend to address them. We say we are serious about correcting certain problems and issues, but I have brought up the Development Corporation before.
I am just going to go to a 1994 Auditor General's report and just try to illustrate the trend here that has been ongoing. In 1994, the Auditor General states that government corporations need to be held accountable for the responsibilities given to them. Immediately after, it says the Development Corporation has not complied with the FAA, the Financial Administration Act, in any of the last three years. This is in 1994.
It does not get any better for the Development Corporation. In 1995, the very next year, it talks about compliance with accountability requirements and specifically section 91 of the FAA, which sets out content requirements for corporate plans. The Act requires the plan to encompass all of the corporation's business and activities, including investments.
Mr. Chairman, it then says, and speaking to other corporations as well:
"The entities all presented some information on the economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of their operations. We could not see that they had included, for all business activities, appropriate details of their performance compared with previously stated corporate objectives impossible to measure."
On to the annual report. The Development Corporation submitted, in 1995, to the Minister their annual report. At least 240 days elapsed. A 60-day extension was requested.
Now go to the next year, that is two brutal years in a row and obviously not much was addressed. In 1996, the Auditor General suggests that there has to be some way to link the Development Corporation's results to the government's economic objectives. They suggest:
"To demonstrate results, the corporation should have developed strategy and indicators that it could measure in response to the requirements and requests of the Minister. This type of response, commenting on successes and shortcomings, would demonstrate whether the objectives are being met."
We asked officials of the Development Corporation whether the board of directors had ever prepared a response and none could be found. This year, 1997-98, the years that we are dealing with now, we again go to compliance with reporting requirements. In the category, past performance and results included in the corporate plan or annual report, the answer is no. The annual report submitted on time? No annual report submitted. It amazes me that we continue to dole money out to the Development Corporation, which seems to have absolutely no ability or interest in maintaining accountability. Clearly this is one example. It is not isolated. There are other problems that the Auditor General has raised.
The Development Corporation really smacks us in the face here and makes us painfully aware that we are doing very little to ensure accountability. I talked earlier today about transparency when we are dealing with lending agencies that this government controls. It seems to me very obvious that if I go to a chartered bank, certain things are going to be kept confidential. I do not expect to have my name, the name of my company, the amount of money that I am borrowing, the date of repayment, all of these things publicized. If I am going after public money, public funds, I think we should be clear, Mr. Chairman, that this is not government money. This is public money. The government is simply there maintaining accountability, watching over the funds and ensuring that they are properly expended.
I do not know why. It just seems that the bureaucracy has a tight grip on this. We are saying we are very concerned about competitive advantages of businesses, and surely nobody could operate a business if these very simple details were released, but I think we have a long way to go in assuring the public that we are operating an open and transparent government.
I am glad Mr. Handley has agreed to take this under advisement and look at it. It is done in other jurisdictions and they do not seem to find a problem with it. Western Economic Diversification, this was the norm. They would have a press release and announce when monies were being loaned.
As I go through the recommendations that we will get to in our committee report after dealing with the Auditor General's report, another one that strikes me, and this is again something that is not here for the first time, but contracting is a serious problem. Contracting to northern businesses is on the decline for some reason, Mr. Chairman. Sole-sourcing is on the increase. I have no idea why we have not been able to clean up the tendering process and why we continue to slide further and further in this area. It is an ongoing trend. This is not something that has just popped up this year. It is something that we have not seemed to want to address for quite some years and it is not getting any better. I think the public and the business community have had enough. We have seen enough of storefront companies being set up under the guise of being a northern local business and allowing that to secure them contracts and a northern preference in the bidding process. It is not fair.
I think clearly everybody in the public can see the difference between a shell company that is set up here and a company that actually employs Northerners...if it is obvious to us and it is obvious to the public, and even obvious to the people in government who administer these policies, I do not know why we cannot find policies that will treat the situation fairly. I know we have looked at a review of the Business Incentive Policy this year. We are doing that this fall. I am glad to see that. I think it is high time, but we have to reverse this trend and I think that is going to take a political will.
Oftentimes, we have northern companies fully capable of doing the work but there is some sort of stigma attached. We assume that if this is highly technical or important work, we have to go south because surely nobody in the North could be qualified. I do not think that is the case, Mr. Chairman. As far as this government's contracting tendencies, we have a lot of work to do to turn the train around and start heading in the right direction. I hope the Minister will address that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.