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ARCHIVED - 2010-11 Part II - Main Estimates


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Introduction to Part II

Structure of the Main Estimates

The purpose of these Estimates is to present to Parliament information in support of budgetary and non-budgetary spending authorities that will be sought through Appropriation bills. These authorities are divided into two categories – Voted and Statutory. Voted authorities are those for which the government must seek Parliament's approval annually through an Appropriation Act. The wording and expenditure authority attributable to each Vote appears in a schedule attached to the Appropriation Act. Once approved, the Vote wording and approved amounts become the governing conditions under which these expenditures may be made; it does not create a commitment to spend the entire amount. Individual expenditure proposals included in Votes seek authority to make expenditures necessary to deliver various mandates that are under the administration of a Minister and are contained in legislation approved by Parliament. Statutory authorities are those that Parliament has approved through other legislation that sets out both the purpose of the expenditures and the terms and conditions under which they may be made. Statutory spending is included in the Estimates for information only.

The basic structural units of Part II are the Votes and Statutory items that, in total, comprise the proposed expenditures under each department or agency.

The following kinds of Votes appear in the Estimates:

  1. Program Expenditures Vote – This type of Vote is used when there is no requirement for either a separate "capital expenditures" Vote or a "grants and contributions" Vote because neither equals or exceeds $5 million. In this case, all expenditures are charged to the one Vote.
  2. Operating Expenditures Vote – This type of Vote is used when there is a requirement for either a "capital expenditures" Vote or a "grants and contributions" Vote or both; that is, when expenditures of either type equal or exceed $5 million. Where they do not, the appropriate expenditures are included in the "Program Expenditures" Vote.
  3. Capital Expenditures Vote – This type of Vote is used when capital expenditures equal or exceed $5 million. Expenditure items in a "capital expenditures" Vote would include items expected to exceed $10,000 for the acquisition of land, buildings and works (standard object 8), as well as the acquisition of machinery and equipment (standard object 9), or for purposes of constructing or creating assets, where a department expects to draw upon its own labour and materials, or employs consultants or other services or goods (standard objects 1 to 9). Different threshold limits may be applied for different capital expenditure classes at the departmental level.
  4. Grants and Contributions Vote – This type of Vote is used when grants and/or contributions expenditures equal or exceed $5 million. It should be noted that the inclusion of a grant, contribution or other transfer payment item in the Estimates imposes no requirement to make a payment, nor does it give a prospective recipient any right to the funds. It should also be noted that in the Vote wording, the meaning of the word "contributions" is considered to include "other transfer payments" because of the similar characteristics of each.
  5. Non-Budgetary Vote – This type of Vote, identified by the letter "L", provides authority for spending in the form of loans or advances to, and investments in, Crown corporations; and loans or advances for specific purposes to other governments, international organizations or persons or corporations in the private sector.
  6. Special Votes: Crown Corporation Deficits and Separate Legal Entities – Where it is necessary to appropriate funds for a payment to a Crown corporation or for the expenditures of a legal entity that is part of a larger program, a separate Vote is established. Where this is the case, a separate Vote structure is established for each. A legal entity for these purposes is defined as a unit of government operating under anAct of Parliament and responsible directly to a Minister.
  7. Special Votes: Treasury Board Centrally Financed Votes – To support the Treasury Board in performing its statutory responsibilities for managing the government's financial, human and materiel resources, a number of special authorities are required and these are outlined below:
    1. Government Contingencies Vote – This Vote serves to supplement other appropriations and to provide for miscellaneous, urgent or unforeseen expenditures not otherwise provided for, including grants and contributions not listed in the Estimates and the increase of the amount of grants listed in these Estimates, where those expenditures are within the legal mandate of a government organization, and authority to re use any sums allotted and repaid to this appropriation from other appropriations.
    2. Government-Wide Initiatives Vote – This Vote supplements other appropriations in support of the implementation of strategic management initiatives in the Public Service of Canada.
    3. Public Service Insurance Vote – This Vote provides for the payment of the employer's share of health, income maintenance and life insurance premiums; for payments to or in respect of provincial health insurance plans; provincial payroll taxes; pension, benefit and insurance plans for employees engaged locally outside Canada; and to return to certain employees their share of the unemployment insurance premium reduction.
    4. Operating Budget Carry Forward Vote – This Vote supplements other appropriations for the operating budget carry forward from the previous fiscal year.
    5. Paylist Requirements Vote – This Vote supplements other appropriations for requirements related to parental and maternity allowances, entitlements on cessation of service or employment and adjustments made to terms and conditions of service or employment of the public service including members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Forces, where these have not been provided from the Compensation Adjustments Vote.

Presentation by Ministry, Department, Agency and Crown corporations

The activities for the departments and agencies for which a Minister is responsible, or reports to Parliament, are grouped together to provide a total ministry presentation. The ministries are then arranged alphabetically to make up the complete Main Estimates. Ministries of State, which may be formed under authority of the Government Organization Act 1970, , involve a more restrictive meaning of the term Ministry than that used here. Ministries of State are treated as departments for presentation purposes in these Estimates.

Each ministry presentation begins with a Ministry Summary table that shows, by Vote or Statutory item, the amount included in the Main Estimates for all organizations comprising that ministry. Abbreviated wordings are used in this table.

All Estimates data shown for the previous year are taken from the Main Estimates of that year. This ensures that all financial information is displayed on a consistent year-over-year basis. Where necessary, adjustments are made to the previous year amounts to reflect changes in organizational structure including changes in ministerial responsibility, to provide a more relevant basis for comparison.

Although the Main Estimates presentation remains virtually unchanged, the new Expenditure Management Information System (EMIS) which is used to capture data electronically utilizes the Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). As a result, the detail in some tables may not add to the totals due to rounding.

In general, the individual organizational presentation is made up of four sections, as explained below. Where a section is not appropriate, it does not appear in the presentation.

Strategic Outcome

This section provides a statement of the strategic outcome.

Program Activity Description

This section serves to explain the program activities by describing how they contribute to the achievement of the strategic outcome(s).

Program by Activities Table

This table shows the total financial resources proposed by program activity. The amounts of the Voted and Statutory authorities are combined and distributed across each program activity. Expenditures for each activity are presented under the headings of Operating; Capital; Grants; Contributions and other transfer payments; and Loans, Investments and Advances. Revenues credited to the Vote, for those departments and agencies authorized to do so, and revenues associated with revolving funds are also included in this table.

Transfer Payments

If applicable, this table provides a listing of transfer payments.

A transfer payment is a grant, contribution or other payment made for the purpose of furthering program objectives but for which no goods or services are received.

Grants, contributions and other transfer payments differ in several respects:

  1. Contributions are transfer payments where the recipients must meet performance conditions and may be subject to audit;
  2. Grants are transfer payments made on the basis of established eligibility and not normally subject to audit;
  3. Grants and their total values have a legislative character and specific descriptions that govern their use; and
  4. Other transfer payments are transfer payments, other than grants and contributions, based on legislation or an arrangement which may include a formula to determine the annual amounts.

Revolving Funds

A revolving fund is a continuing or non-lapsing authorization by Parliament to make payments out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund up to a stipulated limit. As part of this authorization, expenditure requirements are offset, to the extent possible, by revenues generated.

Definitions of Standard Objects of Expenditure

To determine and report more accurately the impact of government revenues and expenditures on the rest of the economy, the net amount of government purchases and sales by standard object must be determined. All departments, agencies and Crown corporations including those that use revolving funds, must charge their expenditures for purchases to standard object expenditure categories. Standard objects are the highest level of expenditure classification used for Parliamentary and executive purposes, and are reported in the Main and Supplementary Estimates and the Public Accounts. The standard objects of expenditure are as follows:

  1. Personnel
  2. Transportation and communications
  3. Information
  4. Professional and special services
  5. Rentals
  6. Purchased repair and maintenance
  7. Utilities, materials and supplies
  8. Acquisition of land, buildings and works
  9. Acquisition of machinery and equipment
  10. Transfer payments
  11. Public debt charges
  12. Other subsidies and payments

Information is also provided on revenues credited to the Vote. In certain specific situations, Parliament authorizes departments or agencies to spend revenues generated from their operations in the same manner as any funds appropriated through that Vote (as reflected in the Vote wording). These amounts offset planned expenditures shown in standard objects 1 through 12, which are shown on a gross basis.

A brief explanation of each standard object follows:

  1. Personnel
    • Salaries and wages, overtime, severance pay, retroactive pay and other special pay of civilian continuing (full-time) or term (part-time, seasonal and casual) employees except those of agency and proprietary Crown corporations, as well as members of the military and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
    • Judges' salaries, those of the Governor General, the Lieutenant-Governors and the indemnities to Members of both Houses of Parliament, and all types of allowances paid to or in respect of continuing and term employees (such as living, terminable, foreign service, isolated post, board and subsistence allowances, shift differential allowances for assistants, and other such allowances).
    • Ministers' motor car allowances, and the expense allowances to Senators and Members of the House of Commons.
    • The government's contribution to various employee benefit plans (the Public Service Superannuation Account, the Supplementary Retirement Benefits Account, the Canada Pension Plan Account, the Quebec Pension Plan, the Public Service Death Benefit Account and the Employment Insurance Account).
    • The Royal Canadian Mounted Police Superannuation Account, the Canadian Forces Superannuation Account and the Members of Parliament Retiring Allowances Account, and the Government's contribution to provincial and other medical and hospital insurance plans and supplementary personnel costs for various purposes.
  2. Transportation and communications
    • Traveling and transportation expenses of government employees, members of the Canadian Forces and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, removal expenses of those persons and their dependants, and living and other expenses of such persons on travel status, judges' traveling expenses, and traveling expenses and allowances payable to Senators and Members of the House of Commons.
    • Transportation of persons by contract and chartered facilities or by other means (including traveling expenses of persons engaged in field survey work, inspections and investigations), and traveling and transportation of non-Government employees such as travel costs of veterans who are applicants for treatment or pensions.
    • Ordinary postage, airmail, registered mail, parcel post special delivery mail, post office box rentals, and any other postal charges.
    • Expenditures relating to the transportation of goods other than initial delivery cost on a purchase (which is included in the standard object covering the cost of the purchase itself) including charges for courier services provided by outside carriers.
    • All costs of telecommunication services by telephone, telegram, cable, teletype, radio and wireless communication (tolls, rates, etc.) and other communication costs such as courier services provided by outside agencies and communication services performed under contract or agreement.
  3. Information
    • Advertising services acquired for publicity and general purposes from advertising agencies or directly for time on broadcast media or for space in print media or on outdoor posters or billboards. It includes advertising and creative work services such as graphic artwork.
    • Publishing services for commissioning, marketing, distribution and sales of publications sponsored by the department, and for the acquisition of related government publications. Also included are services for printing, duplicating, photocopying, text editing, design of graphics, art work, technical and advisory services such as computerized text processing and mass transmission of printed material. In addition, it includes exposition services such as exhibits and associated audio-visual services related to exhibitions and displays.
    • Public relations and public affairs services for attitude and service assessment surveys, sales promotion, marketing, export marketing, public relations and publicity, opinion polls, and contracts to organize and operate focus groups and media monitoring services. It also includes services for speech writing, press releases, briefing, press conferences and special events.
  4. Professional and special services
    • Provision for all professional services performed by individuals or organizations such as payments (in the nature of fees, commissions, etc.) for the services of accountants, lawyers, architects, engineers, scientific analysts, reporters, and translators; for teachers at various levels of educational institutions; for doctors, nurses and other medical personnel; for management, data processing and other research consultants; and for other outside technical, professional and other expert assistance.
    • Payments for hospital treatment, care of veterans and welfare services, payments for the provision of informatics services, payment of tuition for Indians at non-federal schools, purchase of training services under the Adult Occupational Training Act , and payments made to the Canada School of Public Service for training.
    • Payments for Corps of Commissionaires services and for other operational and maintenance services performed under contract, such as armoured cars, laundry and dry cleaning, cleaning of buildings, temporary help, hospitality, storage and warehousing, and other business services, as well as payments made to the Department of Public Works and Government Services for contract administration.
  5. Rentals
    • Rental of properties required for special purposes by the various departments and for the accommodation of government offices and services by the Department of Public Works and Government Services.
    • Hire and charter – with or without crew – of vessels, aircraft, motor vehicles and other equipment, and rental of telecommunication and office equipment including computers.

    Storage and warehousing services is, however, in standard object 4 even though it involves the rental of space.

     

  6. Purchased repair and maintenance
    • The repair and upkeep under contract of the durable physical assets provided for in standard object 8 for Acquisition of Land, Buildings, and Works and of equipment provided for in standard object 9 for Acquisition of Machinery and Equipment.
    • Payments to the Department of Public Works and Government Services for tenant services.
    • Materials, supplies and other charges for repairs undertaken by a department directly are coded to other objects, according to the nature of the purchase.
  7. Utilities, materials and supplies
    • The provision for all payments for services of a type normally provided by a municipality, or public utility service such as the supply of water, electricity, gas, etc., and includes water, light, power and gas services, and payment for such services whether obtained from the municipality or elsewhere.
    • The provision for materials and supplies required for normal operation and maintenance of government services such as:
      • gasoline and oil purchased in bulk; fuel for ships, planes, transport and heating
      • feed for livestock
      • food and other supplies for ships and other establishments
      • livestock purchased for ultimate consumption or resale
      • seed for farming operations
      • books and other publications purchased for outside distribution
      • uniforms and kits
      • photographs, maps and charts purchased for administrative and operational purposes
      • laboratory and scientific supplies, including samples for testing
      • drafting, blueprinting and artists' supplies; supplies for surveys and investigations;
      • chemicals product
      • hospital, surgical and medical supplies
      • works of art for exhibits, and historical material for galleries, museums and archives
      • coal and wood
      • electrical supplies
      • repair parts other than parts normally acquired with equipment at the time of purchase for aircraft, ships, road vehicles, and for communication and other equipment; and all other materials and supplies
      • metal products
      • office and stationers supplies.
  8. Acquisition of land, buildings and works
    • All expenditures for the acquisition of buildings, roads, irrigation works, canals, airports, wharves, bridges and other such types of fixed assets.
    • Improvements involving additions or changes of a structural nature, and for installing fixed equipment which is essentially a part of the work or structure such as elevators, heating and ventilating equipment.
    • All reconstruction of such types of physical assets and such projects performed under contract or agreement.
    • The purchase of land.

    Expenditures pursuant to contracts for new construction for casual employees hired or continuing employees assigned to work full- or part-time on specified projects, travel, professional services, equipment rentals, equipment maintenance and of materials purchased directly for use on such projects are charged to the relevant standard objects (standard object 1 to 9).

     

  9. Acquisition of machinery and equipment
    • Expenditures for the acquisition of all machinery, equipment, office furniture and furnishings, electronic data processing and electronic or other office equipment.
    • Microfilming equipment and supplies, inter-office communication equipment, postal meter machines, machine records and all other office equipment.
    • Motor vehicles, aeroplanes, tractors, road equipment, telecommunications and related equipment, laboratory and other scientific equipment, vessels, icebreakers and other aids to navigation and all other types of light and heavy equipment; includes ammunition and various types of equipment for National Defence, such as ships, aircraft, mechanical equipment, fighting vehicles, weapons, engines and such spare parts and supplies as are normally acquired with that equipment at the time of purchase.
  10. Transfer payments
    • Grants, contributions, and all other transfer payments made by government.
    • Major social assistance payments made to persons such as Old Age Security benefits and related allowances, Veterans' pensions and allowances.
    • Payments to the provinces and territories under the Constitution Acts , the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act , the Canada Health and Social Transfers and for official languages.
    • Payments to Indians and Inuit in support of self-government initiatives, health, educational, social and community development programming and in respect of native claims.
    • Payments to the territorial governments pursuant to financing agreements entered into between the Minister of Finance and the respective territorial Minister of Finance.
    • Capital assistance to industry; research grants and other assistance towards research carried on by non-governmental organizations; scholarships.
    • Sustaining grants to many national and international non-profit organizations.
    • Contributions to international organizations and assessments for membership in such organizations, such as the contribution to the International Food Aid Program and Canada's assessment for membership in the United Nations.
    Most of the payments in this standard object category are identified in the Estimates as "Grants" or "Contributions". The former are not subject to audit and are therefore restricted by Parliament as to amount and recipient and often as to purpose through the approval of the Supply bill which specifies "The grants listed in the Estimates"; the latter are conditional and subject to audit and are not so restricted. Grants and their total values have a legislative character and specific descriptions that govern their use. Grants are also presented in Part III of the Estimates for information purposes.

     

  11. Public debt charges
    • Interest on the unmatured debt of Canada (including Treasury Bills) and on other liabilities such as trust and other special funds.
    • The cost of issuing new loans, amortization of bond discount, premiums and commissions.
    • The cost of servicing and administering the Public Debt.
  12. Other subsidies and payments
    • Payments to Crown corporations that include those made to provide for operating deficits as well as other transfers paid to Crown corporations.
    • Payments to certain non-budgetary accounts (such as the government contributions to agricultural commodities stabilization accounts, as well as benefits u), as well as the write- offs of various types of losses, the annual adjustment of reserves for financial claims and some other miscellaneous items referred to as "Sundries".
    Miscellaneous expenditures include licences, permits and payments for dockage, towage, wharfage and mooring privileges; bonding of government employees, loss of personal effects, and expenditures for small miscellaneous articles and services. Also included are many small items and services that do not lend themselves to identification under specific headings detailed in this summary.

Expenditures internal to the government

Expenditures from internal sources include payments for the costs of goods and services provided by other departments or within a department or by revolving funds.

Revenues Credited to the Vote

RRevenues that are credited to the Vote in accordance with parliamentary authority include a combination of revenues from external and internal sources. Revenues from external sources include:

  • rentals received on government-owned buildings and equipment;
  • receipts from the provision of police services to other levels of government;
  • receipts of revolving funds as a result of transactions with parties outside the government; and
  • recoveries of costs from provincial governments and other national governments.

Revenues from internal sources include recoveries of costs of goods or services provided by one organization to another and the proceeds of sales by revolving funds to parties internal to government.