Government Operations committee  I hope my performance pay is not affected.

Government Operations committee  All bodies of cabinet, including Treasury Board, continue as long as a government continues. Obviously, governments are bound to govern themselves somewhat differently, so it is certainly the case that Treasury Board looked to exercise urgently required business, in terms of approving spending, particularly in a context that there's no vehicle--in respect of last fiscal year, certainly--to proceed with spending if it was new spending, other than through warrants.

Government Operations committee  Thank you. Thanks for the questions.

Government Operations committee  Certainly. The summary of the procedure is the following: when we talk about a normal supply bill—once Parliament approves it in respect to becoming an appropriations act—after it's passed, the government goes to the Governor General with a warrant to be signed, on the basis of Parliament's approval of an appropriations act.

Government Operations committee  You'll see that in two forms. The government fiscal year ends on March 31. Typically, in September, the government will table what are called the public accounts, which detail every cent that the government spent. A month later we will table the departmental performance reports--92 of them, I think it is--which will then list in greater detail, for every one of those agencies, not just the numbers that were in the public accounts but just to remind Parliament how they broke down against program activity, and then also how they broke down against the results that had been targeted, not dollars but actual results, for a program or an activity and what do we measure we achieved.

Government Operations committee  We have very strict guidelines in terms of the accounting. The government shifted its method of accounting a few years ago to accrual accounting so that we are in a position where the government collectively needs to inform Parliament on an accrual basis. In the case of a capital expenditure, in the year the capital expenditure is made, we seek the full amount from Parliament.

Government Operations committee  It would depend very importantly on how the fixed election date then fell within the fiscal year. If an election were to take place early in a new fiscal year and the government of the day had been in a position to get either extended interim supply, as happened in 2004-05, or had full supply, as has happened in some other years, you would have little to no need for special warrants.

Government Operations committee  It's a contingency, until the next possibility of seeking supply.

Government Operations committee  It does, and then TB vote 5 is in fact recovered to its prior amount.

Government Operations committee  This year or normally?

Government Operations committee  These amounts are being voted. With those three exceptions of agencies, nothing is voted for more than one year. Any amount is just in respect of a year.

Government Operations committee  Yes.

Government Operations committee  We actually call vote 5 the “government contingencies” vote. You mean TB vote 5, right?

Government Operations committee  Through the supplementary estimates.

Government Operations committee  More simply put, nothing can be spent without having been voted on in Parliament.