From the Correctional Investigator

A foundational and legal requirement for my Office is the resolution of complaints from federally sentenced individuals against the Correctional Service of Canada. In this regard, the organization fielded 19,005 inquiries, 4,299 formal complaints, conducted 1,270 interviews, and spent 227 days in federal correctional institutions. This level of interaction between investigative staff, including early resolution officers, and federally sentenced individuals are within historic volumes and considerable given the total client population of an estimated 13,000 individuals and the Office’s micro agency status. 

In 2023-24, my Office continued its transition towards the establishment of an enhanced organizational structure. With additional funding approved in Budget 2023, this reporting period was the second of three of years of incremental funding leading to a permanent and ongoing allocation next year. In the medium-term, this budgetary adjustment is intended to help my Office build capacity and expertise in conducting team-based prison inspection activities, as well as other specialized reviews,  to better address the complexity of issues my Office deals with from those behind bars such as mental health, racism, addictions, and intergenerational trauma, build a data analytics capacity, enhance internal and external communications and bolster internal services in relation to access to information and privacy and our reporting obligations to the Central Agencies of Government.

To that end, efforts and resources focused on staffing key operational positions required to build the operational capacity outlined earlier. However, staffing delays coupled with the unplanned departure of key internal services staff, resulted in the organization’s inability to hire the prescribed number of planned full-time equivalents to offset the entirety of the incremental salary funding received. 

Notwithstanding the challenges described above, the Office completed a number of thematic investigations examining, among other nationally significant issues, the Correctional Service of Canada’s grievance system, lifers, quality of care reviews, standalone maximum security institutions and population pressures leading to the inter-regional transfer of women in the correctional system. 

In June 2023, the Office celebrated it 50th Anniversary, an important milestone for those involved in the protection of human rights for those individuals behind bars or supervised in the community. As a reflection of this commitment, I was very pleased to announce Susan Haines as the 2023 recipient of the Ed McIsaac Human Rights in Corrections Award. This award is a recognition of Ms. Haines’s extraordinary career dedicated to social justice, human rights advocacy and community-based corrections.

It is my privilege to submit the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s 2023-24 Departmental Results Report, which provides an overview of our results and achievements in fulfilling our mandate. 

Ivan Zinger J.D., Ph.D.          
Correctional Investigator of Canada

Results – what we achieved

Core responsibilities and internal services 

• Core responsibility 1: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections
• Internal services

Core responsibility 1: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections

In this section 

• Description
• Progress on results
• Details on results
• Key risks
• Resources required to achieve results
• Related government-wide priorities
• Program inventory

Description

The Office of the Correctional Investigator conducts investigations of complaints directed to the Correctional Service of Canada by individual federal incarcerated or supervised offenders, and carries out systemic investigations of issues that affect large numbers of the federal offenders. The Office of the Correctional Investigator reviews all Correctional Service of Canada’s investigations of deaths in custody and serious bodily injury cases to ensure compliance with the law and policy and conducts reviews of all use of force incidents. The Office of the Correctional Investigator’s investigative activities support a safe, lawful and humane federal correctional practice to ensure that federal correctional decisions and practices comply with human rights, law, policy and are fair.

Progress on results

This section presents details on how the organization performed to achieve results and meet targets for its core responsibility: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections. Details are presented by departmental result.

Table 1: Targets and results for Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections

Table 1 provides a summary of the target and actual results for each indicator associated with the results under Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections. 

Departmental Result: A safe, lawful and humane federal correctional practice 

As indicated in Table 1, the Office of the Correctional Investigator has been steady in the achievement of actual results as it relates to pre-established targets. 

Additional information on the detailed results and performance information for the Office of the Correctional Investigator`s program inventory is available on GC InfoBase.

Details on results 

The following section describes the results for the Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections in 2023–24 compared with the planned results set out in the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s departmental plan for the year. 

Result 1: A safe, lawful and humane federal correctional practice

Results achieved in relation to the percentage of recommendations made in relation to individual offender complaints that were addressed by the Correctional Service of Canada.

• The Office of the Correctional Investigator received and processed 4,299 formal complaints against the Correctional Service of Canada during the reporting period. The Investigative Team, consisting of Early Resolution Officers, Senior Investigators as well as the Senior Management cadre (when required), developed recommendations for resolution and were successful in securing the Correctional Service of Canada’s commitment to address the issue of the complaint 91% of the time. The 2023-24 actual results are a snapshot of the organization’s internal data from the week of April 8, 2024 and are in line with planned results identified in the 2023-24 Departmental Plan. The ongoing update of cases may affect future reporting in regard to this performance indicator.

Results achieved in relation to percentage of recommendations made in relation to the Office of the Correctional investigator’s corporate priorities that were addressed by the Correctional Service of Canada.

• Although the organization’s recommendations to the Correctional Service of Canada are non-binding, it is important to note that 80% of the total number of recommendations were addressed in a manner beneficial to the targeted inmate population. The result achieved in the reporting period is consistent with results in previous years including planned results outlined in the 2023-24 Departmental Plan.

• The Office of the Correctional Investigator also developed recommendations in relation to its corporate priorities e.g., the over-representation of Indigenous, Black and other racialized individuals in corrections, issues concerning women’s corrections and the needs of gender-diverse individuals.        
  The Office of the Correctional Investigator also made progress in implementing the priorities of its three-year strategic plan.

  1. Adjust the organizational structure to improve effectiveness and resilience

  The OCI adjusted its organizational structure to allow for developmental and rotational opportunities thereby ensuring better retention and resilience for front line employees dealing with difficult files on a daily basis. Through better planning and communications between teams, collaboration has improved and employees are benefitting from more knowledge and experience sharing. 

  2.    Improve the organizational capacity in planning and conducting systemic investigations and inspections

  The OCI improved its process of planning and conducting systemic investigations and inspections by creating specialized investigative teams and conducting an earlier and more inclusive planning cycle. The OCI further implemented a planning model for institutional visits that included information collection requirements for systemic investigations. A pilot-project for visit reporting was also put in place for implementation in 2024-2025. 

  3.    Optimize information collection to better identify trends, the evolution of specific issues and to better report on our successes

  The OCI has implemented lean principles in its complaints process to better allow for reporting as well as created a new data specialist position. Moreover, in-house training sessions related to various databases and research tools were provided to investigative staff. 

  4.    Strengthen the organization’s position as employer of choice

  Through the success of its new funding request, the OCI has been able to staff new positions to allow for more sustainable workloads, and for teams-based work to better comply with the international standards of prison oversight bodies. A reorganization of the intake and preliminary analysis process has allowed a better distribution of the workload and enhanced collaboration among team members.

Key risks

In light of the organization’s national mandate, volume and complexity of issues facing federally incarcerated persons, and the geographical location of 43 correctional institutions visited regularly, staff absences and turnover creates challenges for any micro agency but particularly for one mandated to being responsive to the concerns of federally sentenced persons in a timely manner. In this regard, the difficult nature of the work of responding to complaints from those behind bars presents challenges for staff retention and recruitment. This has created a risk in the capacity to fulfill the mandate, such as the ability to conduct timely reviews of all use of force incidents and deaths in custody. Risk mitigation requires the continuous assessment of high priority issues and occasional surge teams put in place to address the demand. In addition to a preliminary analysis process related to all incoming complaints, mitigating the risks posed by the sheer volume of cases required the enhancement of the role and training of Early Resolution Officers to support the work of Investigators more efficiently. 

Secondly, the resolution of complaints in an environment traditionally closed to public scrutiny requires that the Office not only be, but be seen to be, independent of the Correctional Service of Canada and the Department of Public Safety. Through strategic planning initiatives, the Office reviews its corporate ties with the Public Safety portfolio to fully assess the risk and implement appropriate controls, where applicable.

Resources required to achieve results 

Table 2: Snapshot of resources required for the Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections

Table 2 provides a summary of the planned and actual spending and full-time equivalents (FTEs) required to achieve results.

Complete financial information and human resources information for the Office of the Correctional Investigator is available on GC InfoBase.

Related government-wide priorities

Gender-based analysis plus 

Issues affecting GBA+ groups in the federal correctional system has been a long-standing priority for the Office of the Correctional Investigator. For example, in order to effectively target and conduct GBA+ analysis and investigation, the Office has a dedicated portfolio for investigating individual complaints as well as systemic issues affecting federally sentenced women. The organization also has a dedicated Deputy Director of the Indigenous Portfolio; a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Champion to raise awareness on issues affecting Indigenous peoples and other equity groups; and an Accessibility Champion to ensure awareness and access for all groups. 

In addition to investigating and responding to individual complaints, the Office’s public reporting has continued to highlight issues, raise awareness, and make recommendations on matters affecting GBA+ groups. In the 2023-24 Annual Report, the Office of the Correctional Investigator reported findings and recommendations examining the experiences of incarcerated women, Indigenous peoples, including Indigenous women. 

Specifically, the Office’s 2023-24 Annual Report investigates and reports on issues regarding the validity and reliability of tools used to assess the risk and security level of Indigenous peoples, given the long-standing concerns regarding the over-representation, over-classification, and securitization of Indigenous peoples – Indigenous women in particular. The report also includes an overview of promising local practices for Indigenous peoples serving federal sentences, inclusive of a summary of approaches and examples of blending western and Indigenous ways of addressing healing and rehabilitation. Finally, the Annual Report includes an investigation on the population pressures at institutions designated for federally sentenced women. The investigation highlights concerns regarding the transfer of incarcerated women away from their home provinces and communities, the lack of access to culturally relevant services, including access to Elders, and the disproportionate impact of these pressures and transfers on Indigenous women. The Office will continue to monitor these issues and other GBA+-related concerns in the coming year.

United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals 

According to the 2022-26 Federal Sustainable Development Strategy, the Office of the Correctional Investigator is required to support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goal 10: Advance reconciliation with Indigenous peoples and take action to reduce inequality. Aligned with this FSDS goal, the Office mainly contributes to UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’s aim to reduce inequality (goal 10).

In an effort to advance the Office’s commitment to reconciliation, combatting systemic discrimination and reducing barriers for Indigenous prisoners in Canada, this year also saw the appointment of a new Deputy Director for the Indigenous Portfolio. This new position’s priorities include developing a framework to guide the Office’s oversight of Indigenous corrections, reviewing Office policies and procedures, and ensuring in-house training on Indigenous issues. Through an Indigenous lens, the Deputy Director advises the Correctional Investigator, senior management, as well as the Office, on issues affecting incarcerated Indigenous individuals, including inequalities of outcome. 

As part of the 2022-23 Annual Report, the Office also tabled Part 2 of an in-depth systemic investigation in Parliament in November 2023, highlighting the experiences of federally sentenced Indigenous Peoples. The report serves as a ten-year follow-up investigation to our special report to Parliament entitled Spirit Matters (2013). The report’s release garnered interest from Canada’s National Indigenous Organizations, whose leaders lent their support by appearing alongside the Correctional Investigator to share their concerns with the Office’s findings, which included numerous examples of disparities faced by Indigenous prisoners, staff, and community-run Section 81 Healing Lodges. 

Finally, in the Office’s 2023-34 Annual Report, the Office also reported on the lack of progress by the Correctional Service of Canada in the six years following the Supreme Court case of Ewert v. Canada (2018). The case served to highlight the fact that actuarial and psychological tools they employ had not been properly validated for use with Indigenous peoples and were therefore discriminatory, placing Indigenous peoples in a position of significant disadvantage. In its decision, the Supreme Court found that their ongoing use of assessment tools could overestimate the risk posed by Indigenous prisoners and that this could contribute to disparities in correctional outcomes in areas in which Indigenous individuals are already disadvantaged. Building on numerous previously unaddressed recommendations by our Office, new recommendations were issued to set clear expectations for CSC to assess the validity and reliability of its assessment and classification tools to inform decision-making with Indigenous offenders. Recommendations also included developing new, more culturally responsive tools, with this work being led by Indigenous individuals. 

More information on the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s contributions to Canada’s Federal Implementation Plan on the 2030 Agenda and the Federal Sustainable Development Strategy can be found in its Departmental Sustainable Development Strategy.

Program inventory

The following program supports the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s Core Responsibility: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections: 

• Ombuds for federally sentenced individuals

In the reporting period, the Program Name the term Ombudsman was replaced with the gender-neutral term of Ombuds.

Additional information related to the program inventory Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections is available on the Results page on GC InfoBase.

Internal services  

In this section

• Description
• Progress on results
• Resources required to achieve results
• Contracts awarded to Indigenous business

Description

Internal services are the services provided within an organization so that it can meet its corporate obligations and deliver its program. There are 10 categories of internal services:

• management and oversight services
• communications services
• legal services
• human resources management services
• financial management services
• information management services
• information technology services
• real property management services
• materiel management services
• acquisition management services

Progress on results

This section presents details on how the department performed to achieve results and meet targets for internal services. 

As with most micro agencies lacking internal services capacity, the Office of the Correctional Investigator has several memoranda of understanding (MOUs) in place with service providers for basic internal services such as financial administration services; pay and compensation; contracting; staffing; and other human resources services. These MOUs include quality control, oversight, monitoring, and performance indicators. Over 50% of the planned spending amount identified as Internal Services expenditures were dedicated to goods and services in support the Core Responsibility: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections and/or the organization as a whole, for example, consultant contracts and the cost MOUs themselves.

The organization continues to implement the five-year IM/IT plan that takes the Office from a mostly paper-based operation to a full digital office. Over the last year, the Office has made progress on its disposition project and with the additional incremental funding stemming from a Treasury Board Program Integrity Submission, the organization began staffing key positions. Regrettably, staffing delays and the unanticipated departure of key internal services staff, did not allow the organization to complete several staffing processes. This affected the organization’s ability to complete its new organizational structure and its financial year-end position. 

Following the assessment of its material management, contracting and real property needs and processes to establish the Office’s forward-looking plans; the Internal Services team developed a Procurement Plan that houses the organization’s obligations with consultants and service providers. The objective here is to ensure the approval of invoices received for services rendered as per the requirements outlined in the Financial Administration Act.

Finally, during the reporting period, a comprehensive review and update of the organization’s policies and directives was completed. The purpose of the policy review and update was to ensure the alignment of the organization’s policies and directives with the Core Public Administration. The government expectation (as outlined by the Privy Council, by Order in Council dated February 15, 1993), is that the Office of the Correctional Investigator: exercise and perform all of the powers and functions of the Treasury Board in relation to personnel management.  Importantly, this will be accomplished under the condition that the Office of the Correctional Investigator exercises such powers and performs such functions in accordance with Treasury Board practices.

Resources required to achieve results

Table 3: Resources required to achieve results fort internal services this year

Table 3 provides a summary of the planned and actual spending and full-time equivalents (FTEs) required to achieve results.

Complete financial information and human resources information is available at the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s GC InfoBase Page.

Contracts awarded to Indigenous businesses

Government of Canada departments are to meet a target of awarding at least 5% of the total value of contracts to Indigenous businesses each year. This commitment is to be fully implemented by the end of 2024–25.

Office of the Correctional Investigator’s result for 2023-24: 

Table 4: Total value of contracts awarded to Indigenous businesses1

Government of Canada departments are to meet a target of awarding at least 5% of the total value of contracts to Indigenous businesses each year. This commitment is to be fully implemented by the end of 2024–25.

As shown in the Table 4, the Office of the Correctional Investigator awarded 15% of the total value of all contracts to Indigenous businesses for the fiscal year. 

1 For the purposes of measuring performance against the minimum 5% target for FY 2023–24, the data in this table is based on how Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) defines “Indigenous business”, which is one that is owned and operated by Elders, band and tribal councils; registered in the Indigenous Business Directory; or registered on a modern treaty beneficiary business list.

2 Includes contract amendments with Indigenous businesses and contracts that were entered into with Indigenous businesses by means of acquisition cards above $10,000.00 ($10K), and may include subcontracts with Indigenous businesses.

3 Includes contract amendments and contracts that were entered into by means of acquisition cards above $10K.

This table shows that, as a result of training provided to staff, coupled with its positive relationship with its contracting service provider, the Office of the Correctional Investigator supported Indigenous businesses in a positive manner.

In its 2024–25 Departmental Plan, the Office of the Correctional Investigator forecasted that, by the end of 2023–24, it would award 3% of the total value of its contracts to Indigenous businesses. 

Measures that the Office of the Correctional Investigator undertook to achieve the 5% minimum target in 2024-25 include:

• Training of management and corporate financial teams completed the mandatory course Indigenous Considerations in Procurement (COR409) from the Canada School of Public Service.
• Worked with its service provider (Public Safety) to improve its processes and incorporate better procurement planning that identifies Indigenous business opportunities and supports the Office.
• Encouraged its service provider (Public Safety) to review internal acquisition processes to support indigenous contracting.
• Review of contracting practices and management awareness of the requirement to contract with Indigenous businesses.

Spending and human resources  

In this section

• Spending
• Funding
• Financial statement highlights
• Human resources

Spending

This section presents an overview of the Office of the Correctional Investigator's actual and planned expenditures from 2021–22 to 2026–27. 

Graph 1 presents how much the Office of the Correctional Investigator spent in 2023–24 to carry out its core responsibility: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections as well as internal services.    

Analysis of actual spending by core responsibility and internal services

Historically, the Office of the Correctional Investigator allocates 80% of its Main Estimates to its core responsibility: Independent Oversight of Federal Corrections with the remaining 20% to Internal Services. This was the case in 2023-24 as demonstrated by the organization’s spending. 

Budgetary performance summary

Table 5. Actual three-year spending on core responsibilities and internal services (dollars)

Table 5 presents how much money the Office of the Correctional Investigator spent over the past three years to carry out its core responsibility and for internal services. 

Analysis of the past three years of spending

The variance between the 2023-24 Main Estimates amount and the total authorities available for use is related to incremental funding (Program Integrity TB submission) received through an allotment increase and the supplementary estimates exercise in the reporting period. This influx of new authorities is also evident in spending in 2023-24, which is higher than the previous two fiscal years. However, staffing delays, and the unanticipated departure of key internal services personnel affected the organization’s ability to hire the number of FTEs planned. Authorities and spending will stabilize in the next two fiscal years as the total and permanent allocation stemming from the Program Integrity TB submission will be reflected in the Main Estimates.

More information from previous years is available on the Finances section of GC Infobase page. 

Table 6. Planned three-year spending on the core responsibility and internal services (dollars)

Table 6 presents how much money the Office of the Correctional Investigator plans to spend over the next three years to carry out its core responsibility and for internal services. 

Analysis of the next three years of spending 

Over the next three fiscal years and thereafter, the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s spending will stabilize at $7.98 million annually. The organization is not planning for significant spending increases over this period, however, minor incremental spending increases related to compensation and pay list allocations are expected. Spending is required to achieve the Office’s important mandate as the Ombuds for federal offenders. 

More detailed financial information from previous years is available on the Finances section of GC Infobase.

Funding

This section provides an overview of the Office of the Correctional Investigator's voted and statutory funding for its core responsibility and for internal services. For further information on funding authorities, consult the Government of Canada budgets and expenditures. 

Graph 2 summarizes the Office of the Correctional Investigator's approved voted and statutory funding from 2021-22 to 2026-27.

Analysis of statutory and voted funding over a six-year period 

The variance between 2021-22 and 2022-23 is attributable to negotiated salary adjustments for unrepresented groups (EX) coupled with the operational carry forward from the previous fiscal year. Additionally, the decreased spending in 2021-22 was due to COVID19 challenges as well as personnel turnover and staffing delays. The expectation from 2023-24 onward can be described as a slight increase in spending to implement program integrity funding needed for an organizational restructure with stabilization starting in 2025-26.

For further information on the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s voted and statutory expenditures, consult the Public Accounts of Canada.

Financial statement highlights

The Office of the Correctional Investigator’s complete financial statements (unaudited) for the year ended March 31, 2024, are available online.

Table 7.  Condensed Statement of Operations (unaudited) for the year ended March 31, 2024 (dollars)

The 2023–24 planned results information is provided in the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s Future-Oriented Statement of Operations and Notes 2023–24. 

Table 8 summarizes actual expenses and revenues, which net to the cost of operations before government funding and transfers. 

Table 9. Condensed Statement of Financial Position (unaudited) as of March 31, 2024 (dollars)  

Table 9 provides a brief snapshot of the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s liabilities (what it owes) and assets (what the Office owns), which helps to indicate its ability to carry out its program and services.

Human resources

This section presents an overview of the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s actual and planned human resources from 2021–22 to 2026–27. 

Table 10. Actual human resources for core responsibilities and internal services

Table 10 shows a summary of human resources, in full-time equivalents (FTEs), for the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s core responsibility and for its internal services for the previous three fiscal years.

Analysis of human resources over the last three years

The FTE data in Table 10 is indicative of an organization’s restructuring required to position itself in order to improve service delivery to its client base, support new services e.g., prison inspections, enhance its internal services and meet its important legislative mandate more efficiently. The Office of the Correctional Investigator received incremental program integrity funding (beginning in 2022-23) to allow it to do just that. The progressive increase in actual FTEs over these three fiscal years is in line with that funding.

Table 11. Human resources planning summary for the core responsibility and internal services

Table 11 shows information on human resources, in full-time equivalents (FTEs), for the Office of the Correctional Investigator’s core responsibility and for its internal services planned for the next three years. 

Analysis of human resources for the next three years

Over the next three fiscal years, the Office of the Correctional Investigator will establish its new organizational structure. To achieve this, the organization sought Program Integrity funding in the amount of $1.1M in 2023-24, $1.7M in 2024-25 and $2.3M starting in 2025-26 and ongoing to address urgent and critical gaps that currently do not allow it to meet its mandate as an effective and efficient correctional oversight agency. This funding will support the Office in more effectively executing its mandate of investigating and bringing resolution to individual offender complaints as well as investigating systemic issues of concern, conducting prison inspections and the development of recommendations to the Correctional Service of Canada, that if implemented, can be measured to determine their impact on the prison population. Moreover, the funding will address considerable gaps in key internal services and functions. The planned FTEs presented in Table 11 above is reflective of the progressive and incremental nature of the program integrity funding allocated to the organization. In 2025-26 and thereafter, the Office of the Correctional Investigator will be at full capacity and no additional increases to the complement is expected. 

Corporate information

Departmental profile

Appropriate minister(s): The Honourable Dominic LeBlanc, P.C., K.C., MP.

Institutional head: Ivan Zinger, J.D., Ph.D

Ministerial portfolio: Public Safety

Enabling instrument(s): Corrections and Conditional Release Act

Year of incorporation / commencement: 1973 pursuant to the Inquiries Act and 1992 pursuant to the Corrections and Conditional Release Act.

Reporting framework

The Office of the Correctional Investigator’s approved departmental results framework and program inventory in 2023–24 are as follows:

Departmental contact information

Mailing address:        
Office of the Correctional Investigator Canada        
PO Box 3421, Station D        
Ottawa, Ontario         
K1P 6L4, Canada

Telephone: 1-877-885-8848        
Fax: 613-990-0563        
Email: org@oci-bec.gc.ca         
Website: oci-bec.gc.ca

Supplementary information tables

Over the last fiscal years, the Office of the Correctional Investigator has demonstrated its commitment to GBA Plus through its investigative work on Use of Force involving federally incarcerated Black, Indigenous, Peoples of Colour and other vulnerable populations including women and individuals with mental health concerns. The organization has also demonstrated its commitment to Green procurement through its compliance with its Public Safety contracting service provider green procurement strategy.

Additionally, following the approval of the 2022 to 2026 Federal Sustainable Development Strategy, the Office of the Correctional Investigator developed its sustainable strategy, including clearly established Green procurement measures. The organization’s 2023-27 Departmental Sustainable Development Strategy Report is available on its website.

The Office of the Correctional Investigator is committed to continuously contributing to reporting on its the GBA Plus initiatives, Sustainable Development, responses to Parliamentary committees and external audits. These commitments will be reflected in future supplementary information tables.

The following supplementary information tables are available on Office of the Correctional Investigator’s website:

• Gender-based analysis plus 
• Response to Parliamentary committees and external audits

Federal tax expenditures

The tax system can be used to achieve public policy objectives through the application of special measures such as low tax rates, exemptions, deductions, deferrals and credits. The Department of Finance Canada publishes cost estimates and projections for these measures each year in the Report on Federal Tax Expenditures. This report also provides detailed background information on tax expenditures, including descriptions, objectives, historical information and references to related federal spending programs as well as evaluations and GBA Plus of tax expenditures.

Definitions

appropriation (crédit)

Any authority of Parliament to pay money out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund.

budgetary expenditures (dépenses budgétaires)  

Operating and capital expenditures; transfer payments to other levels of government, departments or individuals; and payments to Crown corporations.

core responsibility (responsabilité essentielle) 

An enduring function or role performed by a department. The intentions of the department with respect to a core responsibility are reflected in one or more related departmental results that the department seeks to contribute to or influence.

Departmental Plan (plan ministériel)

A report on the plans and expected performance of an appropriated department over a 3-year period. Departmental Plans are usually tabled in Parliament each spring.

departmental priority (priorité)    

A plan or project that a department has chosen to focus and report on during the planning period. Priorities represent the things that are most important or what must be done first to support the achievement of the desired departmental results.

departmental result (résultat ministériel)    

A consequence or outcome that a department seeks to achieve. A departmental result is often outside departments’ immediate control, but it should be influenced by program-level outcomes.

departmental result indicator (indicateur de résultat ministériel) 

A quantitative measure of progress on a departmental result.

departmental results framework (cadre ministériel des résultats) 

A framework that connects the department’s core responsibilities to its departmental results and departmental result indicators.

Departmental Results Report (rapport sur les résultats ministériels)

A report on a department’s actual accomplishments against the plans, priorities and expected results set out in the corresponding Departmental Plan. 

fulltime equivalent (équivalent temps plein) 

A measure of the extent to which an employee represents a full personyear charge against a departmental budget. For a particular position, the fulltime equivalent figure is the ratio of number of hours the person actually works divided by the standard number of hours set out in the person’s collective agreement.

gender-based analysis plus (GBA Plus) (analyse comparative entre les sexes plus [ACS Plus])

An analytical tool used to assess support the development of responsive and inclusive how different groups of women, men and gender-diverse people experience policies, programs and policies, programs, and other initiatives. GBA Plus is a process for understanding who is impacted by the issue or opportunity being addressed by the initiative; identifying how the initiative could be tailored to meet diverse needs of the people most impacted; and anticipating and mitigating any barriers to accessing or benefitting from the initiative. GBA Plus is an intersectional analysis that goes beyond biological (sex) and socio-cultural (gender) differences to consider other factors, such as age, disability, education, ethnicity, economic status, geography (including rurality), language, race, religion, and sexual orientation. 

government-wide priorities (priorités pangouvernementales)

For the purpose of the 2023–24 Departmental Results Report, government-wide priorities are the high-level themes outlining the government’s agenda in the November 23, 2021, Speech from the Throne: building a healthier today and tomorrow; growing a more resilient economy; bolder climate action; fighter harder for safer communities; standing up for diversity and inclusion; moving faster on the path to reconciliation; and fighting for a secure, just and equitable world.

horizontal initiative (initiative horizontale) 

An initiative where two or more federal departments are given funding to pursue a shared outcome, often linked to a government priority. 

non budgetary expenditures (dépenses non budgétaires)

Net outlays and receipts related to loans, investments and advances, which change the composition of the financial assets of the Government of Canada.

performance (rendement)

What a department did with its resources to achieve its results, how well those results compare to what the department intended to achieve, and how well lessons learned have been identified.

performance indicator (indicateur de rendement)

A qualitative or quantitative means of measuring an output or outcome, with the intention of gauging the performance of an department, program, policy or initiative respecting expected results.

plan (plan)

The articulation of strategic choices, which provides information on how a department intends to achieve its priorities and associated results. Generally, a plan will explain the logic behind the strategies chosen and tend to focus on actions that lead to the expected result.

planned spending (dépenses prévues)

For Departmental Plans and Departmental Results Reports, planned spending refers to those amounts presented in Main Estimates. A department is expected to be aware of the authorities that it has sought and received. The determination of planned spending is a departmental responsibility, and departments must be able to defend the expenditure and accrual numbers presented in their Departmental Plans and Departmental Results Reports.

program (programme)

Individual or groups of services, activities or combinations thereof that are managed together within the department and focus on a specific set of outputs, outcomes or service levels.

program inventory (répertoire des programmes)

Identifies all the department’s programs and describes how resources are organized to contribute to the department’s core responsibilities and results.

result (résultat)

A consequence attributed, in part, to an department, policy, program or initiative. Results are not within the control of a single department, policy, program or initiative; instead they are within the area of the department’s influence.

Indigenous business (entreprise autochtones)

For the purpose of the Directive on the Management of Procurement Appendix E: Mandatory Procedures for Contracts Awarded to Indigenous Businesses and the Government of Canada’s commitment that a mandatory minimum target of 5% of the total value of contracts is awarded to Indigenous businesses, a department that meets the definition and requirements as defined by the Indigenous Business Directory.  

statutory expenditures (dépenses législatives)

Expenditures that Parliament has approved through legislation other than appropriation acts. The legislation sets out the purpose of the expenditures and the terms and conditions under which they may be made.

target (cible)

A measurable performance or success level that a department, program or initiative plans to achieve within a specified time period. Targets can be either quantitative or qualitative.

voted expenditures (dépenses votées)

Expenditures that Parliament approves annually through an appropriation act. The vote wording becomes the governing conditions under which these expenditures may be made.