CCA Bulletin 06/07

Ottawa, Monday, February 19, 2007

The CCA Applauds the Blue Ribbon Panel’s Report on Grants and Contributions

Dear regular CCA Bulletin reader – Please note that in the next two weeks we are anticipating an unusually heavy cycle of bulletin communications emanating from our Ottawa bureau.   So, please keep your eyes peeled on your inbox for developments regarding our activities and the wonderful world of Canadian federal cultural policy!

Just the Facts

The Blue Ribbon Panel on Grants and Contributions has finally released its report to the President of the Treasury Board, the Hon. Vic Toews.

While some predicted that the Blue Ribbon Panel would recommend further restrictions or curtailing grants totally, instead they have presented a coherent and responsible approach to managing grants and contributions throughout the Canadian federal government.

Grants and contributions represent an annual expenditure of almost $27 billion. The report presents a wide range of consensus amongst the recipients of grants and contributions who uniformly complained of onerous accountability requirements, delays in decision-making and/or the release of funds.  Interveners also told the Panel that there should be uniform standards for program design, evaluation, and administration across the federal government’s network of departments and agencies.

The Panel addresses these concerns with 32 clear, sensible recommendations to eliminate overly complex accountability measures and to establish program administration standards as well as clear definitions and terms for grants and contributions throughout the federal system.

The Canadian Conference of the Arts (CCA) has, for some time now, been making the case for less onerous accountability requirements that should be reflective of the amounts of money in question.  The CCA is pleased to see that the Panel’s report endorses this position in its recommendations.  The Panel also recommends that multi-year funding be standardized and that grant and contribution recipients be given more flexibility in the management of funds within the overall project budgets.

The President of the Treasury Board has thanked the Panel for its work and has indicated that the Government will proceed with the implementation of the recommendations, which according to the Panel, should be spread over a period of four months to three years.

Tell Me More

The Panel was created by the previous President of the Treasury Board, the Hon. John Baird (now Minister of the Environment) in order to examine the host of grants and contribution programs operated by the federal government.

The Panelists were Frances Lankin, Ian Clark, and Marc Tellier, who had to withdraw from the panel for business considerations.  The Panel consulted with Parliamentarians, public servants, grant and contribution recipients, and conducted online consultations with recipients and program managers within the government.

The Report of the Blue Ribbon Panel contains some very interesting insights into the use of grants and contributions

In addition to the 32 specific recommendations the Panel distilled them into four simple proposals to government;

• Respect the recipients – they are partners in a shared public purpose. Grant and contribution programs should be citizen-focused. The programs should be made accessible, understandable and useable.
• Dramatically simplify the reporting and accountability regime – it should reflect the circumstances and capacities of the recipients and the real needs of the government and Parliament.
• Encourage innovation – the goal of grant and contributions programs is not to eliminate errors but to achieve results, and that requires a sensible regime of risk management and performance reporting.
• Organize information so that it serves recipients and program managers alike.

Another useful element to the Report is the breakdown of how the almost  $27 billion in grants and contributions is spent. According to the Panel it is as follows:

The CCA congratulates the Blue Ribbon Panelists for a thorough, thoughtful, and constructive Report.  They have once again validated the importance of grants and contributions as important tools of government, and have stressed the partnership between government and the recipients in the development of policy and services in the interests of all Canadians.  Now it falls to Parliamentarians and the public that elects them to put these recommendations into action, to the benefit of everyone.

What Can I Do?