The committee was studying the 2025-26 supplementary estimates (B), and appeared before it were Jason Jacques, Interim Parliamentary Budget Officer, and colleagues Mark Creighton, Govindadeva Bernier, and Mark Mahabir from the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO).
Jason Jacques testified that the supplementary estimates (B) request an additional $10.7 billion, with the largest single voted expenditure being $1.6 billion for Health Canada's dental care plan. He noted that the public accounts, budget, and supplementary estimates were all tabled in the same week, totalling about 10,000 pages, which he said hampers timely scrutiny by parliamentarians. He recommended moving up the legislative deadline for tabling the public accounts to September 30 to give parliamentarians better information when considering supplementary estimates and the budget.
Mark Creighton explained that the $1.6 billion increase for the Canadian dental care plan was driven by higher-than-forecasted program uptake and pent-up demand from beneficiaries, not by programmatic cost growth. He did not make specific recommendations or disagree with other witnesses.
Govindadeva Bernier stated that the 34% annual increase in emergency management costs for First Nations communities since 2017 is driven by real pressures from more frequent wildfires and floods. He deferred to Jacques on the link to climate change, which Jacques later confirmed was identified in a prior PBO report.
Mark Mahabir testified that the PBO sent information requests to five departments on November 5, 2025, with a deadline of November 19, but received a response only from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. He noted the requests sought five Excel files with fields to fill out, not a large volume of documents.
Jacques added that the PBO was unable to obtain basic budget and staffing information from the Defence Investment Agency, which he characterized as a deemed refusal, and that the Treasury Board comptroller general indicated some information from the comprehensive expenditure review might be available in December. He disagreed with the implication that the committee should not be involved, stating that the Parliament of Canada Act directs such disputes back to parliamentarians.
The committee debated a motion by Kelly Block to order the production of documents for six PBO information requests, with a one-week deadline and a provision that if the PBO is not satisfied, the chair would report to the House. Marie-Hélène Gaudreau proposed a friendly amendment to extend the deadline to two weeks, which was accepted by Block. Jenna Sudds then moved a subamendment to change the reporting mechanism so that if the PBO is not satisfied, the committee would set aside time to discuss next steps instead of reporting directly to the House. After debate, the subamendment was agreed to on division.
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