Guide to the Preparation of Part III of the
2005-2006 Estimates - Reports on Plans and Priorities and Departmental Performance Reports

Introduction

This guide is designed to provide assistance to departments in the preparation of their 2005–06 reports on plans and priorities (RPPs) and departmental performance reports (DPRs).

Both the RPP and DPR documents form part of the Government Expenditures. Further detail on the relation of the RPP and DPR to other expenditure documents is provided in Section IV.

The guide is divided into nine distinct parts:

1. Forward
2. What’s New
3. Introduction
4. Effective Public Reporting
5. RPP and DPR Document Structures:
   • Section I – Overview
   • Section II – Analysis of Program Activities by Strategic Outcome
   • Section III – Supplementary Information
   • Section IV – Other Items of Interest
6. General Information
7. Electronic Reporting
8. Relation of the RPP and DPR to Other Expenditure Management Documents
9. Contact List

It is recommended that RPPs and DPRs follow the same structure outlined in the"RPP and DPR Document Structures" section. This will ensure that the reader can find the same type of information in the same sections across all RPPs and DPRs.

In order to assist departments in maintaining that structure, the Secretariat is providing a suite of templates for both the RPP and DPR. The use of these templates is not mandatory. The templates can be uploaded onto your computer in MS Word or WordPerfect and departments can then fill in the appropriate sections. Make sure to delete any unnecessary tables, text, or instructions and make any appropriate adjustments to meet the reporting needs of your department.

At any time, should further assistance be required regarding the terminology used in this document, a lexicon can be located at http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/est-pre/estime.asp .

For all other types of assistance, or if you would like to pass along comments, please direct your request to the appropriate individual in the contact list at the end of this guide.

Effective Public Reporting and Reporting Principles

Effective Public Reporting

What is it?

Effective public reporting ensures that the public is provided with timely, accurate, clear, objective, and complete information about government policies, programs, services, and initiatives. In the Canadian system of parliamentary democracy and responsible government, the government has a duty to explain its policies and decisions, to inform Canadians of its national priorities, and demonstrate how Canadians will benefit. Information is necessary for Canadians—individually or through representative groups or members of Parliament—to participate actively and meaningfully in the democratic process.

RPPs and DPRs are primary instruments of accountability to Parliament . They are planning and performance documents written by each department and, as such, reflect the responsibility of ministers and their organizations to explain to Parliament their plans and expected results and account for the performance achieved. Explaining how the expected results are to be achieved and the means used to achieve them provides a basis for confidence in the government’s stewardship of public resources.

What is an Effective RPP or DPR?

For the RPP to be an effective public planning report, it must provide clear and concise information on plans, priorities, expected results, and resources over a three-year planning period.

For the DPR to be an effective public performance report, it must provide clear, concise, and balanced information on what has been achieved with respect to the plans, priorities, expected results, and resources originally identified in the RPP. DPRs report on the most recently completed fiscal year.

Accordingly, both documents must:

• provide complete and credible information on a department’s financial and non-financial status;
• demonstrate value for money and sound management;
• provide the foundation for dialogue between Canadians and their government; and
• reflect the department’s internal planning and performance measurement systems that are based on and are consistent with its PAA.

The two documents complement each other, in the first instance by reporting on plans and expected results, and in the second by reporting on actual results and accomplishments. They should provide enough information to demonstrate how resources and activities, as well as programs and services, logically support the achievement of strategic outcomes. The knowledge gained from the performance reporting exercise should be applied to the next set of plans as a means of ensuring that the department learns from its experiences.

Who is it for?

The target audience for planning and performance reports consists mainly of parliamentarians who rely on these reports to perform their role of holding the government to account for the public funds entrusted to it. Parliamentarians need reports that respond directly to their key questions, provide high-quality information, and are expressed in ways that enable them to easily absorb the information. While a wide range of other audiences uses these reports, their needs can also be met by reports that fully meet the same requirements of parliamentarians. Both reports must logically demonstrate to both parliamentarians and Canadians how departmental achievements will make a difference in their lives.

How do you address parliamentarians’ needs?

In preparing RPPs and DPRs, it should be kept in mind that parliamentarians generally direct their attention to high-level questions about government-wide priorities and the value of existing strategic outcomes resulting in specific questions about individual programs or services.

Regardless of where interest is focussed, reported information on planning and performance should provide answers to four fundamental questions:

• What is it? (For example, provide a short description of the program or service, its development, its allocated resources and, if appropriate, the location where it is delivered, etc.)
• For the RPP, why is the department doing it? (For example, link to enduring benefits to Canadians, identification of the actual needs and the results expected, etc.)
• For the DPR, is it succeeding? (For example, provide a discussion of results, operational choices that have been made, outputs, and short-term outcomes achieved in the context of strategic outcomes, as well as a comparison to baseline information.)
• Is the cost acceptable? (For example, provide information on planned or current cost, resource history, etc.)

These questions provide the foundation of information provided in RPPs and DPRs, either directly or through the provision of specific links to departmental web sites. They also support the reporting principles presented below and are a summary of information that assists parliamentarians in assessing departmental planning and performance and then deciding if further investigation is warranted.³

How does it work?

Through its reporting guidance for RPPs and DPRs, the Secretariat seeks to ensure that each department can present to Parliament a coherent and effective picture of its three-year plan and associated performance.

RPPs provide planned spending information on a strategic outcome and program activity basis, as per the PAA, and describe departmental priorities, expected results, and the associated resource requirements covering a three-year period.

DPRs provide accounts of accomplishments and results achieved in the most recently completed fiscal year against performance expectations, as set out in the corresponding RPP, and explain the progress made towards the department’s strategic outcomes.

Principles for Effective Reporting to Parliament

Over the last decade, reporting principles have been suggested to departments to assist them in the development of their reports to Parliament. These principles have evolved based on experience, the needs of federal departments, and consultations with parliamentarians, the Office of the Auditor General of Canada, and the Canadian Comprehensive Auditing Foundation (CCAF-FCVI Inc.).

The Secretariat is proposing the following set of integrated reporting principles as the basis for preparing RPPs and DPRs. These principles reflect all key elements highlighted in previous guidance. They have been integrated to reflect the complementarities of the RPP and DPR documents. Taken together, they show the link between plans, performance, and achievements and they demonstrate departmental commitments to managing for results. Fundamentally, the content of these reports should be relevant, reliable, balanced, and comparable to provide parliamentarians and Canadians with a comprehensive and effective picture of the government’s plans and use of taxpayers’ money.

The reporting principles are intended to support departments in fulfilling their reporting responsibilities without being overly prescriptive. It is important, however, that the principles be applied in each report. With careful adherence to them, RPPs and DPRs will be valuable tools for departments, parliamentarians, and Canadians alike. It is anticipated that these reporting principles will continue to evolve through time to further support improvements.

Principle 1: Focus on the benefits for Canadians, explain the critical aspects of planning and performance, and set them in context

Information in an RPP and a DPR should be relevant to members of Parliament and to Canadians. The reports should provide a comprehensive but succinct picture of the department’s endeavours and accomplishments over the reporting period. They should help parliamentarians bring government to account for voted appropriations and engage in an ongoing dialogue around the setting of government priorities and the allocation of resources.

• There should be a focus on program activities and, if applicable, key programs and services and their expected results as per the PAA, and how they support strategic outcomes that directly benefit Canadians and Canadian society. There should also be an indication of how your organization’s outcomes relate or contribute to the government’s broader priorities as established by the Speech from the Throne or the budget.
• The information reported should be straightforward, flow logically across key reporting elements (i.e. priorities, program activities, and their expected/actual results), and explain how they support or ultimately contribute to strategic outcomes.
• The operating environment and the strategic context of the department for the reporting period should be well described. Internal and external challenges, risks, and opportunities (including capacity considerations) should be identified at the departmental level, along with an explanation of how these will affect your plans and performance and be addressed in the delivery of program activities and/or key programs and services.
• Important horizontal linkages and involvement in government-wide initiatives⁴ should be identified and their implications surrounding planning and performance should be explained.
• The principal mechanisms by which programs and services are delivered to Canadians, e.g. policies, programs, regulations, grants, public participation, advocacy, etc. should be highlighted. The methods to achieve performance should be employed with propriety, sound stewardship of resources, and fair treatment of people. This should be demonstrated in both the planning and performance reports.
• In response to the recommendations outlined in the sixth report of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates released in September 2003, the DPR should include a short summary of parliamentary committee reports that pertain to the reporting period and to the department’s associated work, along with a link or reference to more information. In addition, departments are to briefly summarize any chapter of a report made by the Auditor General and add links to the department’s response.
• RPPs are to identify any upcoming internal audits and/or evaluations and reference any significant findings (using electronic links) from any internal audits and/or evaluations not already identified in any previous RPP or DPR. DPRs are to reference any significant findings from internal audits and evaluation and external audit reports, explaining their relationship to departmental performance and the next course of action to improve departmental results.

Principle 2: Present credible, reliable, and balanced information

Readers should be confident of the validity and reliability of the information presented in both the RPP and DPR.

In particular, it is important that a coherent and balanced picture of performance be presented in the DPR. This requires the department to acknowledge where performance did not meet expectations and provide the necessary explanations as to why. Readiness to acknowledge performance that did not meet expectations shows an ability to adapt, which should be reflected in subsequent RPPs.

• Information and departmental structures presented in the reports should be consistent with the Management Resources and Results Structure (MRRS), specifically the Program Activity Architecture (PAA) component.
• Expected results and performance indicators should be drawn from internal departmental management systems used for planning, budgeting, and measuring performance and should be the same as those used in the PAA.
• Both positive and negative aspects of performance should be reported. No one expects that all expected results be fully achieved every year. Recognizing this obvious reality will enhance the credibility of your report. Explanations of how the department uses both positive and negative results to make adjustments and improvements towards achieving its strategic outcomes should also be provided.
• Changes in plans, priorities, and resource allocation, as well as changes resulting from lessons learned should be explained, as should ways they might affect measuring and reporting on performance.
• Financial tables should be accurate and thorough, as they link to the financial appropriations given to departments. They are essential components of accountability to Parliament.
• There should be confidence in the methodology and data used to substantiate reported performance. Use baseline⁵ and comparative information to help readers better understand the information being provided and to allow them to arrive at a realistic assessment of the department’s performance. Indicate the source of the information, particularly if graphs or tables are presented. Use factual and/or independently verifiable information, such as information from audits or evaluations of programs, policies, or initiatives.
• In reporting or referring to survey results, it is important that the reader be provided with assurance of the quality of such information or be in a position to understand its limitations. For that purpose, departments must ensure that references to survey data are accompanied by a short description of the survey and how it was conducted, along with relevant information or key indicators of the data’s quality and limitations (such as the response rate, the sample size and the confidence interval). This information should be readily accessible through short unobtrusive footnotes or endnotes in the RPP or DPR or be publicly accessible through a web link to the report. In November 2005, the Office of the Auditor General (OAG) released a chapter in which it examined the presentation of survey results in 2003-2004 Departmental Performance Report and recommended to TBS that its reporting guidelines ask departments to provide sufficient information on the quality and limitations of survey results to ensure that readers be in position to judge the reliability of the data reported. For further information on the OAG’s chapter see
  http://www.oag-bvg.gc.ca/domino/reports.nsf/html/20051102ce.html ;
• Do not take for granted that the reader fully understands all the issues involved or the workings of the department. Instead, supply the information required for such understanding. To avoid overloading the reports, this information can be provided by using links to departmental publications or to the departmental Web site.

Principle 3: Associate performance with plans, priorities, and expected results, explain changes, and apply lessons learned

Information in an RPP and a DPR should facilitate comparisons between reports and over time.

• Planning information (strategic outcomes, priorities, program activities, expected results, and resources) should lay the foundation for departments to report on in their performance documents.
• Performance information should compare past expectations and commitments from the previous RPP to actual results and resources and apply that knowledge to the next planning document. Revising and improving plans is an indication of sound management practices. Departmental plans are expected to change in response to changing environments or further to lessons learned from past performance. Departments may also compare their performance with baseline information and that of similar organizations to help understand the significance of results achieved.
• Reporting should be consistent from year to year. If the basis for comparison changes (i.e. if there are internal reallocations or there is a shift in priorities), the reasons for this and the amendments should be explained in both reports and made clear to the reader.

Principle 4: Link resources to results

At the most basic level, accountability means explaining what has been accomplished with the resources entrusted to a department. Planned and actual spending should be outlined in sufficient detail for the reader to understand the linkages between program activities, expected and actual results, and the resources available in support of the department’s priorities and strategic outcomes.

The linkage between financial and non-financial information is key in ensuring meaningful reporting to Parliament. It is important to demonstrate that resources are being used efficiently and effectively and that the quantity of resources expended corresponds to the departmental priorities being pursued and the outcomes being achieved.

In particular, you should ensure you do the following:

• Explain significant internal reallocations to meet emerging internal priorities or higher government priorities, or to better sustain progress toward the achievement of the strategic outcomes (i.e. amounts and areas affected, including both the source of funds for the reallocation and the program or initiative that received the funding). Appropriate references should also be made in the financial tables.
• Departments whose non-statutory programs were reviewed, as part of the expenditure management review exercise, should address the findings of these reviews in their report and the effect it will have on their operations.

RPP and DPR Document Structures

The DPR section was updated as June 1, 2006.   The RPP section doesn’t contain any updates, as the 2005-06 RPPs were tabled on March 24 ^th , 2005.

Both the RPP and DPR should follow the same structural format in order to allow readers to find similar types of information in the same sections, no matter which document they are reading.

In order to assist departments in preparing their documents, we have provided a suite of templates on the Secretariat’s Web site. Once selected, the templates can be uploaded from the Web into a word processing file (MS Word or WordPerfect). The use of these templates will ensure the proper structure is followed; however, their use is not mandatory. Please note that departments can delete unnecessary sections from the templates and can add additional sections or information, as necessary.