accounting

Thursday July 19, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday July 19, 2018

Doug Ford’s PCs launching inquiry into previous Liberal government’s spending

Ontario Premier Doug Ford is vowing to “clean up” the government’s finances, in part by launching an inquiry into the previous Liberal regime’s spending.

April 27, 2018

The PCs have created an Independent Financial Commission of Inquiry to probe Ontario’s past spending and accounting practices. The commission will be led by former B.C. Liberal premier Gordon Campbell, as well as Al Rosen, a forensic accountant, and Michael Horgan, a consultant with decades of public service experience.

“The commission will give you the answers about what went wrong,” Ford told reporters, from behind a podium bearing the slogan “Restoring trust.”

The commission’s findings will be made public, and Ford said the results should provide some advice about how to fix the situation.

December 11, 2014

“We go in there, we’re going to find additional waste, we’re going to find areas that we can drive efficiencies,” he said.

The premier is pledging that the inquiry would build on the work of the province’s auditor general, Bonnie Lysyk, who has been critical of government accounting standards that she said understate its deficits by billions.

“The office of the auditor general appreciates the government’s intent as part of the financial commission of inquiry to address the accounting practices we have previously expressed concerns about,”  Lysyk said in a statement. (Source: CBC News) 

 

Friday April 27, 2018

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday April 27, 2018

Auditor’s deficit allegations could be bad news for all parties

History, like politics, has a way of repeating itself. Especially at election time.

February 18, 2017

In opposition 15 years ago, Ontario’s Liberal Party smelled a rat. They accused the Tory government of the day of cooking the books.

Playing the reformist card in the 2003 campaign, Dalton McGuinty’s Liberals proposed that all future pre-election budgets be reviewed by the auditor. Upon winning power, McGuinty ordered a special audit that uncovered a deficit of more than $5 billion “hidden” by the previous Progressive Conservative government.

Fast forward to 2018. Now, the PC opposition is accusing the governing Liberals of playing with numbers — and this time, the auditor general of the day, Bonnie Lysyk, is on their side.

December 11, 2014

Lysyk held a news conference Wednesday to declare the Liberals are understating the true deficit by $5 billion.

The law of unintended consequences has a way of catching up to you. All that Liberal reformist zeal from 2003 is now fresh ammunition for the PCs as they accuse McGuinty’s successor as of fudging the numbers.

There is nothing new in the auditor’s latest report. But in auditing as in politicking, timing is everything. Which makes the Liberals electorally unlucky.

Few paid the auditor much heed two years ago when Lysyk suddenly declared she was reversing the accounting rules established by previous auditors: Accumulated surpluses in major public sector pension plans could no longer be counted as budgetary assets, as they had been since Tory times.

The effect of her ruling was to produce a gaping multibillion-dollar hole in the government’s accounting framework at the very moment they were striving to meet a 2017-18 target for deficit elimination. The government convened an outside panel of accounting and pension experts, who declared that Lysyk couldn’t have it both ways: Just as pension shortfalls count as a liability on the balance sheet, a pension surplus should count for something — not nothing, as the auditor insisted.

Lysyk still wouldn’t budge. But Bay Street didn’t bite, ignoring the auditor’s alarm bells. Credit rating agencies also looked at the books but didn’t buy into her alarmist assessments. (Continued: Hamilton Spectator) 

 

 

SaveSave

Saturday February 18, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday February 18, 2017

Ontario’s auditor general is not satisfied after an expert panel sided with the Liberal government in a $10.7-billion accounting dispute.

The auditor and the government disagree over whether a $10.7-billion surplus in two jointly sponsored pension plans should appear as an asset on the government’s books.

December 11, 2014

Auditor general Bonnie Lysyk says that because the government doesn’t have the right to unilaterally access that surplus, it shouldn’t count as an asset.

But an expert panel this week said that it is an asset because it has a future economic benefit, since the government could reduce contributions and would therefore have additional funds to spend elsewhere.

But Lysyk says in order for her to issue a clean audit opinion, she wants to see a letter from the unions representing workers covered by the plans saying the province can use that money.

The government says joint pension agreements already spell out how surpluses are to be handled and no additional letter is needed. (Hamilton Spectator) 

 

Monday, March 24, 2014

Monday, March 24, 2014By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Monday, March 24, 2014

Council pulls Festival of Friends funding

The city will withhold funding from the Festival of Friends over a long-festering dispute about financial transparency with the controversy-dogged free music event.

The three-day festival, which has a $1-million budget, is the only arts group funded by the city as a board or agency that doesn’t provide audited financial statements — annual budget results verified by a chartered accountant.

That hasn’t stopped council from handing over $85,000 each year — until now. In a surprise move Wednesday, the budget committee voted to withhold further funding until the festival hands over the requested information.

“Every single year we say we want audited financial statements and it doesn’t happen,” said Councillor Brad Clark, who authored the motion. “All of these other organizations comply, but we don’t expect him to?”

A shocked festival head Loren Lieberman immediately came to City Hall after learning about the decision on Twitter and had a heated exchange with Clark, asking why council would metaphorically “punch me in the balls.”

Lieberman was outraged he wasn’t warned in advance of the meeting and said city staff assured him he had submitted sufficient documentation. The festival has already been forwarded close to $20,000 for 2014, which won’t be clawed back.

“If they need more (information), ask for it,” he said. “Don’t punch me in the face and then tell me the reason afterwards.”

Lieberman submitted a statement of operations for the festival, which city finance head Mike Zegarac described as “an improvement” over past years, but not on par with the other boards and agencies.

Zegarac noted the city requests audited financial statements but does not specifically require them. “It’s a practice, not a policy,” he said. (Source: Hamilton Spectator)

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Tuesday, August 13, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Pamela Wallin’s ‘troubling’ expense audit headed to RCMP

The independent audit of Senator Pamela Wallin’s expenses has been referred to the RCMP by a Senate committee that is also imposing restrictions on her travel and asking her to repay more of her expenses.

The internal economy committee met Tuesday morning on Parliament Hill and agreed to a set of recommendations in response to the Deloitte audit it received Monday. The audit assessed more than $500,000 worth of Wallin’s travel claims and determined whether they were all related to Senate business or not.

The RCMP referral and other recommendations are contained in the committee’s report that says Wallin had an “unusual pattern” of stopping in Toronto, where she owns a condo, on her way from Ottawa to Saskatchewan, the province she was appointed to represent in 2009.
Between January 2009 and Sept. 30, 2012, Wallin made 95 trips between the nation’s capital and Saskatchewan and 75 of them involved stops of one or more nights in Toronto, the auditors found.

The audit report contains a chart that outlines all of Wallin’s expense claims — the amounts, the dates, the travel routes, and details of her trips, including whom she met with and other activities.

Expense claims were deemed appropriate if Wallin stayed over in Toronto in order to avoid a late arrival in Saskatchewan or if there was Senate business in Toronto. But the review found many instances where Wallin had said on her expense forms that she was on Senate business but in fact was not. (Source: CBC News)

[slideshow_deploy id=’1787′]