Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration
First Report of Committee--Debate Adjourned
February 27, 2020
Moved the adoption of the report.
He said: Honourable senators, this report deals with the Senate’s budget for 2020-21. The anticipated budget is $115.6 million and is based on the recommendation of the Subcommittee on the Senate Estimates. This amount represents an increase of $1.4 million, or 1.2% over the 2019-20 budget.
For a background on the process of arriving at this budget, the work of determining the Senate’s budget rests with the Subcommittee on the Senate Estimates, where members met with each of the Senate Administration’s executive committee and the majority of the directors. The members had the opportunity to discuss and question all funding requests during each directorate’s detailed presentation to the subcommittee. Directors were also asked to identify any risks to their operations and to address how any new funding would mitigate the identified risks.
Throughout its consideration of the Main Estimates, the committee took into account the changes taking place in the Senate and various ongoing modernization processes. The Main Estimates were prepared based on the assumption that the Senate’s level of activity for the planning year would be similar to the level observed in 2018-19 and early 2019-20.
Moving briefly to some of the details of the expenditures, there are two parts within the budget. One is statutory and the other is voted. The statutory portion deals with money allocated by legislation. This includes senators’ basic and additional allowances and pensions, senators’ travel and living expenses, telecommunications, and employee benefit plans. Any shortfalls in these categories at the end of the year are covered by the Treasury Board. The total amount of the statutory budget is $35.8 million, almost flat with last year.
The voted items are for the workings of the Senate. They cover senators’ office budgets and Senate administration. The total financial envelope for the voted portion is $79.7 million, an increase of $1.3 million, or 1.7%.
Within the voted amounts, the senators’ office budgets are increasing by $513,000. This increase is entirely related to the inflation rate of 2.1%. There is also a net increase of $175,000 for the senators’ statutory budget, which includes an increase of $285,000 for senators’ additional allowances and pensions, an increase of $79,000 for senators’ travel and living expenses, and a reduction of $189,000 for senators’ telecommunications expenses.
The next major category of expenses is the Senate Administration, which is increasing by $225,000, or 0.5%. This amount represents new expenditures of $1.5 million less the reduction in funding from previous years that ends this year totalling $1.3 million. For further elaboration, the new funding requirements include the following major items.
One is an increase of $538,000 for the Chamber Operations and Procedure Office to maintain editing, proofreading and text coordination and for the Human Resources Directorate for reclassification and providing better support in areas such as labour relations and compensation.
Next is an increase of $261,000 for employee meal and taxi allowances, position reclassifications and additional personal budget for standby provisions.
The last is an increase of $240,000 for cafeteria services and maintenance services in the new Senate of Canada building.
From a staffing standpoint, the budget includes 10 additional positions, which include three previously approved at CIBA. Management also presented temporary funding initiatives totalling $1.7 million. These requests, however, will be funded out of the current budget envelopes and there will be no increase. Most significant among the initiatives is a $1.4 million investment for information technology infrastructure renewal.
The Subcommittee on the Senate Estimates noted that after a $1.4 million total net increase proposed for 2020-21, $995,000 has specifically already been approved by CIBA in the current fiscal year. This includes $544,000 for the organization of two international conferences, $300,000 for three legal service positions and $151,000 for corporate services mainly related to software licence costs.
To conclude, I would like to thank the subcommittee for its work and encourage all senators to adopt this report.
Senator Marwah, will you take a question?
Yes.
Senator Marwah, I know that maybe you don’t have this particular information on hand, but I would like for you to provide us with the information that comes under the statutory regime. What is the amount of money for the five following positions: the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, the Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, the Senate Opposition Whip, the Senate Deputy Whip of the Opposition and the Chair of the Opposition Caucus? I would like to know what the amount of money is, if there was any increase in that and how that compares to the three government representatives in the Senate now, instead of the old system where there were five positions. I would certainly appreciate an answer to that.
Thank you for that question. I don’t have the very specific details of each of those lines, but what I can tell you is that, for budgeting purposes, the budgets for the House officers and caucuses were held flat compared with the previous year. However, this morning at CIBA we approved the actual estimates for next year, which are decreased from last year. But I can get you the exact details line by line in due course.
