May 17, 2006
Books cooked
The Auditor General confirms what we already knew:
The former Liberal government hid more than $60 million in unexpected costs from Parliament, left no written record of important decisions taken by officials, and may have broken numerous contracting rules in its handling of the controversial gun registry, Auditor General Sheila Fraser has found.
The Canadian Firearms Program, which the Conservatives are expected to start dismantling, perhaps as early as today, has incurred $87.3 million in startup costs since 2002 - three times the budgeted amount - for a computer system that does not yet work, Fraser revealed in her long-awaited report.
She found that Parliament was "misinformed" about the true costs of the registry. Of the computer startup costs, $60.8 million - $39 million in 2002-03 and $21.8 million in 2003-04 - was not brought to Parliament for proper approval in contravention of the government's own accounting policies.
"Had these costs been properly recorded, the Canadian Firearms Centre would have had to seek additional funds (from Parliament) or would have overspent the authorized cap on its spending," Fraser said in her opening remarks to reporters. "We consider this a serious matter for Parliament's attention, because the ability of the House of Commons to approve government spending is fundamental to Parliament's control of the public purse."
CanWest News Service reported the major findings of Fraser's audit last week, including that the source of the continuing problems with the gun registry continues to be a $273 million contract with Team Centra, a computer firm, that has been delayed since May 2002 because of myriad legislative changes, thanks to fierce opposition to the program and the scrutiny of opposition parties.
Kill the gun registry. Kill it and nuke the site from orbit, just to be sure.
Damian P.
Posted by damian at May 17, 2006 07:54 AM