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[ Backgrounder ]
February 14, 2001
OTTAWA - The Honourable Lucienne Robillard, President of the Treasury Board of Canada, Minister responsible
for Infrastructure and Member of Parliament for Westmount - Ville-Marie, today announced measures to improve the practice of
internal audit and evaluation in the Government of Canada.
"The revised policies on internal audit and evaluation
are part of the Government's ongoing commitment to continuous management improvement and accountability," Minister Robillard
said.
These measures are the result of parallel reviews of the two policies that included public and private sector consultations.
Improved internal audit and evaluation supports the management agenda, as articulated in Results for Canadians: A Management
Framework for the Government of Canada.
The revised policy on internal audit seeks to reposition the internal audit community within government as a provider of
independent assessments to departmental senior management on all important aspects of risk management strategies, management
control frameworks, and information used for decision-making and reporting.
The revised evaluation policy gives evaluation a central role, distinct from internal audit. It also places a greater emphasis
on evaluation as a management function that provides objective information on the results of programs and initiatives that affect
Canadians.
Both policies come into effect on April 1, 2001. The Treasury Board Secretariat will establish Centres of Excellence for
Internal Audit and Evaluation in order to provide leadership, advice and support to departments for the successful implementation
of these policies.
"The release of these two revised policies clearly demonstrates the Government of Canada's commitment to helping managers
measure results and consequently manage taxpayers' dollars more effectively," added Minister Robillard.
Refer to the attached backgrounders for additional information on the revised policies. The policies are posted on the Treasury
Board Secretariat Web site at: http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca
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For more information, contact:
Russell Milon
Press Secretary
Office of the President of the Treasury Board of Canada and Minister responsible for Infrastructure
(613) 957-2666
Chantal Scarlett
Media Relations
Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat
(613) 957-2391
TTY (Telecommunications device for the hearing impaired) -- (613) 957-9090.
IF THERE IS A DISCREPANCY BETWEEN ANY PRINTED VERSION AND THE ELECTRONIC VERSION OF THIS DOCUMENT, THE ELECTRONIC
VERSION WILL BE CONSIDERED OFFICIAL.
Release of Revised Internal Audit (IA) and Evaluation Policies
Background
- The President of the Treasury Board is announcing two revised Government of Canada policies with accompanying standards - an
Internal Audit policy and an Evaluation policy. The policies, intended to improve management practices government-wide, are
effective April 1, 2001.
- As a follow-up to the 1997 Report of the Independent Panel on Modernization of Comptrollership in the Government of
Canada, the Treasury Board Secretariat initiated separate, but parallel, reviews of the two policies. The reviews
included consultations throughout the process with deputy ministers, heads of internal audit and evaluation, and other senior
public service and private sector managers.
- The reviews identified the need for better-positioned internal audit and evaluation functions government-wide which would
also contribute significantly to the achievement of the government's management agenda tabled in Parliament in March 2000, Results
for Canadians: A Management Framework for the Government of Canada. The result of both reviews is improved policies on
Internal Audit and Evaluation.
Highlights of the Policy on Internal Audit
The revised Policy on Internal Audit and its standards are aimed at providing independent assessments (or
"assurance") of the soundness of risk management strategies, management control frameworks, and information used for
decision-making and reporting. Other highlights of the revised Internal Audit policy are summarized below:
- Requires an active audit committee that is chaired by a senior departmental executive.
- Ensures that departmental heads of internal audit have an unimpaired ability to carry out their responsibilities, including
reporting audit findings.
- Requires that internal auditors have unlimited access to all departmental documents.
- Requires that management action plans adequately address the recommendations contained in internal audit reports and that
they are implemented.
Highlights of Evaluation Policy
The revised Policy on Evaluation and its standards emphasize the role of evaluation in providing timely, objective information
on the performance of government policies, programs and initiatives. It is intended to help managers achieve better results for
Canadians by stressing the need for sound evaluation. The main highlights of the revised Evaluation Policy are summarized below:
- Establishes a stand-alone policy and evaluation function (it is now separate from the Internal Audit Policy and its
function).
- Expands the policy to evaluate the success of programs, policies and initiatives in meeting their objectives (the current
policy refers primarily to the evaluation of programs).
- Broadens the scope to include departmental, interdepartmental and intergovernmental considerations (the current policy
stresses departmental programs).
- Stresses the need for managers to embed the discipline of evaluation in all their work, including the design of new
policies, programs or initiatives.
Commonalities
- Treasury Board Secretariat will establish Centres of Excellence for both the internal audit and evaluation functions to
provide leadership, advice and support to departments in meeting the new policy requirements.
- Departments will develop annual internal audit plans and evaluation plans.
- Departmental managers will incorporate the findings of internal audits and evaluations into their priority setting and
decision-making.
- All completed internal audit and evaluation reports are to be made easily accessible to the public in both official
languages.
- The Treasury Board is making a significant investment to support these initiatives.
- It will provide $40 million of funding over a two-year period - an increase of approximately 35% in resources available for
these functions across government.
- This will enable the Government to engage approximately 150 additional internal audit and evaluation staff across
government. Today, there is approximately 500 staff involved in these functions across government.
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