The committee met at 2:34 p.m.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Approval of Agenda and Minutes

Mr. Speaker: You have all seen the agenda that we have circulated.

Any changes to the agenda? None.

May I have a motion to approve the agenda as circulated?

Motion approved.

Mr. Speaker: Then review the approval of the draft minutes of the February 19 meeting of this committee.

Any changes to the minutes of February 19? None.

Then may I have a motion to approve the minutes as circulated?

Motion approved.

[2:35 p.m.]

Mr. Speaker: All right. Number 3 is an update from the Clerk.

Clerk’s Update

K. Ryan-Lloyd (Clerk of the Legislative Assembly): Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker, and good afternoon, Members. As always, I appreciate the opportunity to update you on a number of matters at the Legislature and to fulfill my accountability to you as members of the Legislative Assembly Management Committee.

I’d like to open with an expression of thanks and appreciation to Legislative Assembly staff for their dedication and hard work at the assembly, particularly over the very busy last few months. I, as always, appreciate their support and dedication to our institution and look forward to working alongside them to support the new sitting period, which, of course, opens on Monday, March 1.

In conjunction with many of the commitments made during the workplace review process that was undertaken last year, we have a number of all-staff initiatives that are currently underway and which I’d like to just mention briefly to your committee. Members will know that the assembly administration has begun to undertake steps to develop a strategic plan for the Legislative Assembly administration. As you know, all of our staff have a collective duty to support members in the institution in a wide variety of roles.

The strategic planning process, to date, has been a very open and inclusive process, and we are looking forward to holding the first in a series of all-staff meetings on March 5 to incorporate broad input from staff on those strategic goals and priorities. I’ll look forward to presenting an update to your committee later this year.

Also, as another outcome of the workplace review process, on Monday I was happy to help contribute to the development of a new internal communications strategy for the Legislative Assembly with the launch of an all-staff survey, and I encouraged all Legislative Assembly employees to take a few minutes out of their day to provide us with some valuable feedback.

During the workplace review process, which was conducted by ADR Education, staff noted that internal communications can play a very key role in broadening information-sharing, raising awareness of organizational priorities and initiatives, and diminishing silos and other obstacles to organizational cohesion and effectiveness. This new survey will, I hope, help to deliver on our commitment to engage staff and to help us develop an internal communications strategy, to be completed by April 30.

With respect to other all-staff events, tomorrow afternoon, Thursday afternoon, I’m really happy to be co-hosting, along with our Speaker, our employee recognition event, known as the legislative lights ceremony. It will be a virtual event beginning at 2:30. It will be hosted by Speaker Chouhan and me from the chamber and with viewing stations around the building.

Staff have just received, with special thanks to the legislative lights working group and Jacqueline Quesnel, a special celebration package today. I’m really excited to celebrate our successes over the past 18 months with a variety of peer-nominated award recipients from so many departments, both individual and team recognition. It will be an event, I’m sure, that will be much enjoyed and highly memorable for all.

My last update item is with respect to a facilities update. Members will know, given the age of our building, that from time to time we have had different challenges just with maintaining water quality throughout the building. So we have a commitment, on a regular basis, to test water throughout the building. There are different tests that are undertaken by the legislative facilities services on a regular basis.

I just wanted to advise members of this committee that our latest tap water testing was completed in January of this year, January of 2021. Of the ten water samples that were taken from various locations on the precinct, the results were that lead concentration was below the maximum acceptable concentration in all areas. All applicable guidelines and regulations continue to be met.

Members will also know that in all kitchen areas of the building, water filtration systems have now been installed. Those are also available in most washroom areas as well. But we do continue to recommend that tap water not be consumed directly and that filtered water be used wherever possible.

[2:40 p.m.]

We will continue, as we do, to monitor water quality throughout the year, with our next testing period in June 2021. As I haven’t had a chance yet to bring a water quality update to the committee for some time, I wanted to include that today. Again, thanks to the legislative facilities services team for being on top of that with us and providing us with regular updates.

That completes the topics that I wanted to bring forward today. But as always, I’m happy to answer any questions you might have.

Mr. Speaker: Thank you, Kate.

Any questions? None.

All right. Let’s, then, move to item 4. That is the third quarter financial update.

Consideration of
Quarterly Financial Statements

M. Burke: Good afternoon, everyone. This is the Q3 executive financial summary report for the period ending December 31, 2020. This includes nine months of actual results, April 1 to December 31, and three months of forecasted numbers between January 1 and March 31, 2021.

You’ll see, at a high level, the total operating expenses there are currently forecast to be $3.2 million underspent against budget, and the total capital expenses are currently forecast to be $0.5 million underspent against budget.

Focusing on the operating expenses, if we scroll down towards the bottom of the page there, you’ll see that these are separated by function. There are three functions we use. These include member services, caucus support services and administrative support services.

The member services are currently forecasting to be over $269,000 overspent against budget. This is due to the snap election, resulting in additional costs from transitional systems and transitional allowance. This is partially offset by no MLA inflationary increase in the current fiscal year and the impacts of COVID, such as reduced travel.

The caucus support services are currently forecast to be $389,000 underspent against budget, mainly as a result of COVID, due to reduced travel and office and business expenses.

The administrative support services are currently forecast to be $3.1 million underspent. This is mainly due to staff vacancies, reduced program and travel, and modified House and committee activities due to COVID.

Moving on to page 2, there are three departments there under administrative support services that I want to address in more detail. The first one is the Office of the Clerk. They are currently forecast to be overspent by just over $300,000. This is as a result of an organizational restructure that took place early this fiscal year. Some of these additional costs included transfer of salaries from the Clerk of Committees, which you will see is currently forecast to be just under $500,000 underspent.

The second department is human resources operation, currently showing an overspend of 22 percent. This is as a result of higher legal costs due to bargaining and investigation, and also professional services, which includes a strategic planning costs initiative we’re working on this year.

The third one is information technology. These additional overspend costs result from additional positions and overtime, professional services due to election costs and the network breach, equipment to support remote work, an increase in Microsoft 365 licensing, laptop peripherals and network upgrades to constituency offices.

I’ll now move on to the final page there for capital expenditures. You’ll see that we’re currently forecast to be underspent by just under $0.5 million. The main highlight here is that the savings are a result of capital planning due to project delays. This is just over $1 million. This is partially offset by an overspend by IT due to election-related costs and network security upgrades. This is a result of the capital portion as opposed to the operating portion.

That’s at a high level. There’s more detail in the report, so I’m happy to answer any questions.

[2:45 p.m.]

Mr. Speaker: Any questions? None. Okay.

I just want, if we are not having any further discussion on this subject…. Members who have been members of this committee in the past will remember that the committee would entertain a motion after its considerations of quarterly financial updates to post them on the Legislative Assembly website. On the advice of the staff, I would like to suggest that this practice be changed.

I would like to invite a member to move a motion that, on a go-forward basis, the quarterly financial updates be posted on the Legislative Assembly’s website after they have been considered by the committee. This will position us so that we do not require a motion after every time. Once this committee update has been discussed and considered at the meeting, then we will automatically put that on the website of the Legislative Assembly for the public to see.

If that is okay with you as committee members, somebody can move a motion.

B. D’Eith: I can move that the quarterly financial updates be posted on the Legislative Assembly’s website after they’ve been considered by the committee.

Motion approved.

S. Furstenau: Mr. Speaker, can I just ask a question?

Mr. Speaker: Yes, please.

S. Furstenau: I’m just wondering on a timeline. Is the expectation that the reports would go up fairly immediately? What kind of timeline would that be for the posting?

A. Sogomonian (Clerk Assistant, Parliamentary Services): I can answer that question, Mr. Speaker.

Yes, it’s very, very shortly after the meeting — at most, I would say, within 12 hours, just depending on when the committee’s meeting time ends; the staff that assist us with doing that work may have already left for the day. But in the case of a meeting like today, for example, when we end at four, we’d be able to do that right after the meeting.

Mr. Speaker: Any further clarification? If not, thank you so much.

Let’s move to item 5.

Capital Projects Update

H. Woodward: The next document that has been provided to the committee members is the 2020-21 capital projects summary, by department. This particular document just has a bit more information by project. As Mike previously mentioned, our capital budget for the current fiscal year, for capital, is $5.95 million. This breaks down that amount by the individual projects proposed by each department for the year.

What you’ll notice in the document before you is that it identifies the status of the projects as at December 31, 2020. It indicates the approved budget for those individual projects. Any subsequent project approval that has been provided…. That would be — depending on the threshold, by either the Clerk, the subcommittee on finance and audit, or this committee — the year-to-date expenses as at December 31, the forecasted spend for those individual projects, the forecasted under- or overspend and then, of course, the percentage of budget remaining. So this essentially provides the members of this committee with a snapshot of the status of the individual capital projects for the current year.

I’d be happy to take any questions.

Mr. Speaker: Any questions? I don’t see any.

All right. Thank you so much.

Let’s, then, move on to item 6. May I have a motion to proceed in camera?

It has been moved and seconded.

Motion approved.

The committee continued in camera from 2:50 p.m. to 3:47 p.m.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Mr. Speaker: Thank you very much, everybody, for your participation.

Staff, thank you so much for all the information that you provided. If we need more information, we will continue to discuss the matters.

We’ll see you soon. Thank you.

The committee adjourned at 3:47 p.m.