annual report to parliament 2012-2013

[internal services]

[program description]

The CRA's internal services provide an important part of the overall effectiveness of our program delivery. We recognize that our success as an organization is built on a solid corporate foundation that is sustained by sound financial management, secure and reliable information technology infrastructure, and a diverse and high-performing workplace. To ensure that the CRA remains a world-class tax administration, we are committed to integrating our internal services across the full spectrum of our tax and benefit programs to ensure we continue to modernize how we deliver services.

2012-2013 financial resources (thousands of dollars)

(Footnote 1): Planned spending has been restated from what was shown in the Canada Revenue Agency 2012-2013 Report on Plans and Priorities in order to distribute the real property accommodations funding (previously centralized in the internal services program) to all applicable programs. It should also be noted that planned spending excludes severance payments, parental benefits and vacation credits, as this funding is received during the fiscal year and is only included in actual spending.

(Footnote 2): This figure represents the actual spending for the program on a modified cash basis. Please refer to page 156 for an explanation of how this figure relates to the CRA Financial Statements - Agency Activities.

2012-2013 financial resources (thousands of dollars)

[performance analysis and lessons learned]

[human resources]

During a year characterized by change in the public service and at the CRA, we continued to improve our human resources regime to ensure that we have the knowledgeable and committed workforce needed to successfully deliver our programs. Across the CRA, approximately 40,000 employees contribute to the administration of our tax programs as well as the successful delivery of economic and social benefits to Canadians.

Key results:

• The CRA updated its Strategic Workforce Plan, including the rejuvenation of its recruitment strategy to meet current workforce requirements and support future business needs. In September 2012, we launched initiatives aimed at recruiting auditors from the private sector to sustain our technical capacity
• We created a new leadership development program to ensure we have the right leaders in place to meet our current and future needs
• We implemented a new integrity framework containing a complete system of policies, procedures, and tools to strengthen the management of integrity at the CRA and ensure that we sustain the public's trust

The 2012-2013 period saw the wind down of the harmonized sales tax initiative with the province of British Columbia which is returning to the PST/GST model effective April 1, 2013. Under an agreement between the CRA and the province of BC, the province made job offers to its former employees that joined the CRA as a result of the HST implemented in July 2010. The Government of Canada also signed an agreement with the province of Prince Edward Island to implement a harmonized sales tax effective April 1, 2013.

The CRA continued to manage changes in operational authorities related to staffing, including the 700 employees that have transferred to Shared Services Canada. The CRA has developed a multi-year human resources plan to proactively manage savings measures through attrition, vacancy management, decreases in new hiring, and workforce adjustment when necessary. This plan will also help us achieve our savings objectives and build a workforce with the skills necessary to meet future Agency business goals.

[information technology]

Information technology (IT) is critical to the CRA's capacity to continue to deliver a world-class tax and benefits administration to Canadians. The CRA has a strong IT planning program in place and our IT strategy is an integrated part of our formal business planning processes. This integrated approach ensures that we will continue to have sustainable, reliable, and secure business application systems that fully support our CRA program business lines.

Our IT infrastructure has continued to provide the CRA with the capacity needed to support both current and emerging business needs. The important role that information technology plays in enabling new service and compliance innovations at the CRA can not be over stated. As an organization, our ability to innovate and move forward is empowered through the use of information technology. For example, our IT systems successfully processed over 18 million tax returns that were electronically filed between February and April 2013. Our busiest electronic filing day was April 30, 2013, when we received 1,232,048 returns without incident, and there were no major service disruptions during the entire 2013 tax-filing season.

Key results:

• Work continued on the redesign of our individual income tax return processing system. This redesign will ensure a robust, flexible, and sustainable technology platform for our personal income tax program
• Through our collaboration with Shared Services Canada, we have ensured that our new state-of-the-art data centre has the IT capacity and flexibility necessary to meet our current and future business requirements
• Our internal IT helpdesk support was consolidated to offer centralized service support to core business programs and to meet evolving service needs. This resulted in a reduction of IT operating costs of $2.3 million
• A business intelligence (BI) framework and roadmap was developed to help guide the development of the necessary BI technology platform needed for advanced reporting and business analytics

This year, the CRA received two Government Technology Exhibition and Conference 2012 distinction awards for demonstrating leadership and excellence in the innovative management and application of information technologies for our business intelligence foundation project and our GST/HST pre-assessment national inventory project.

In November 2011, Shared Services Canada became responsible for delivering email, data centre, network, and telephony services across the federal public service. In 2012-2013, we established a governance model between the CRA and Shared Services Canada. It defines the priorities and responsibilities related to our business relationship, taxpayer confidentiality, and data security. We have also completed the payroll transfer of all former CRA employees now working for Shared Services Canada.

[finance and administration]

The CRA effectively and efficiently manages one of the largest budgets in the Government of Canada (spending details are available starting on page 96 of the CRA's Annual Report to Parliament). To manage our resources, we ensure that all investments are aligned with our strategic directions and priorities.

Key results:

• We are on target to meet all of our financial commitments
• We have updated our resource management strategy to support key government savings initiatives by providing regular assessments of the CRA's financial position
• We completed the chief executive officer and chief financial officer certification process to assure a strong system of controls over financial management and reporting (additional information about the systems of internal control over financial reporting can be found in the CRA's Annual Report to Parliament 2012-2013 on page 149)

To support government efforts to reduce operating costs, the CRA implemented a new approach to the provisioning of office space. In 2012-2013, we developed a portfolio plan that will reduce the CRA office space footprint by at least 72,000 square meters. This new approach will save the CRA $33.5 million annually.

[security and integrity]

Protecting taxpayers' privacy and confidentiality is central to the integrity of the CRA and Canada's tax system. To meet their tax obligations or apply for benefits, Canadians must give us personal and financial information. The CRA takes its responsibility to safeguard this information very seriously. Canadians trust that their information is only accessed for authorized purposes, and that it is handled with the utmost security. We are committed to maintaining strong internal controls to prevent the inappropriate access, use, and disclosure of information.

Key result:

• We strengthened our processes and controls ensuring that employees only have access to the systems required to perform their job functions
• We updated our emergency plan to maintain the uninterrupted delivery of programs (such as benefit payments) in the case of emergency

[communications]

Effective communications allow the CRA to inform Canadians about tax and benefit services.

Key results:

• We developed a marketing strategy to promote our electronic services and respond to the service expectations of taxpayers and benefit recipients
• The CRA has actively supported the Government of Canada's Web renewal initiative to modernize the Government's online presence, and meet accessibility standards for Canadians with disabilities, including Web sites and social media
• This filing season, we implemented an initiative to reduce printing cost and support online services. We sent personalized letters to affected taxpayers detailing the changes and outlining the filing options available to them

As with all federal departments and agencies, the CRA is subject to the provisions of the Access to Information Act and the Privacy Act. These acts give Canadians the right to access information that is under the control of a government institution. In 2012-2013, we received 3,137 access to information requests, 85% of which were completed on time. We also received 1,980 privacy requests, and completed 93% of them within statutory limits.

[contribution to the federal sustainable development strategy]

The CRA supports the federal sustainable development strategy and contributes to the greening government operations, through our internal services program. We contribute to the following target areas of theme IV (shrinking the environmental footprint - beginning with government) of the federal sustainable development strategy:

• greenhouse gas emissions;
• electronic waste;
• managed print;
• internal paper consumption;
• green meeting guide; and
• green procurement.

Key results:

• Office paper use was reduced by an additional 2%
• We implemented a national initiative to reduce the number of printing units, and achieved a 9.3:1 average ratio of employees to printing units
• We achieved 15.4% green procurement for goods and services, and reached a 96% level of procurement officers trained in green procurement
• As a result of our effort to reduce travel expenses, greenhouse gas emissions from our fleet of vehicles decreased by 19.6%, surpassing our planned target by 2%
• Sustainable development clauses and environmental specifications were included in three new contractual arrangements valued at over $1 million

Additional information on CRA greening government operations activities can be found on the CRA website at: www.cra-arc.gc.ca/gncy/prfrmnc_rprts/menu-eng.html.

[management oversight]

To ensure we meet our management oversight responsibilities, the CRA uses two complementary tools: the Management Accountability Framework (MAF) assessment conducted by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat and the Board of Management Oversight Framework (BoMOF) assessment, conducted by our Board of Management. Together, these two assessment tools provide a comprehensive evaluation of the CRA's management performance.

The 2012-2013 MAF assessment examined integrated risk management and financial management and control, for which the CRA received a strong (risk management) and an acceptable (financial management and control) rating. Our Board of Management conducted its sixth assessment of performance, covering areas for which they have oversight responsibility as outlined in the Canada Revenue Agency Act. Of the 12 areas reviewed this year, eleven were found to be "strong" or "acceptable" and one presented an "opportunity for improvement". The positive results of these assessments should provide Canadians with assurances that the CRA is actively pursuing management excellence.

Additional information on these CRA performance assessments is available electronically at:

• MAF assessment - please visit www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/maf-crg/methodology-methodologie-eng.asp
• BoMOF assessment - please go to www.cra-arc.gc.ca/gncy/bomof-cscd/ssmnt-eng.html

[conclusion]

During the past year, we worked to ensure that we have the people, infrastructure, and resources required to maintain our world-class tax administration. We are taking a strategic approach to human resource planning and are developing the capable and confident workforce we require to generate the innovative solutions needed to meet the evolving service needs of Canadians. To ensure the CRA continues to meet future challenges, we are investing in infrastructure and technology platforms to support our core operations. These investments are balanced and grounded in sound financial management practices and will continue to create efficiencies, ensure sustainability, and support future innovations in the delivery of our programs and services.

We are improving the support we provide to taxpayers and benefit recipients by making it easier for them to use our Web sites, find answers to their questions, and do routine transactions online. In this way, we are easing the compliance burden and helping Canadians meet their tax obligations and receive accurate benefits and credits. For those who understand their obligations but fail to comply, we are enhancing our compliance enforcement programs and taking swift and appropriate action to ensure compliance.

We are achieving our strategic outcomes through innovation and a commitment to service excellence, compliance enforcement, and integrity. We believe that Integrity forms the bedrock of our self-assessment system and we understand that the trust and confidence Canadians place in their tax system is a direct result of the CRA's commitment to conducting its administration with total integrity. As we move forward, the CRA will continue to be guided by our corporate core values of integrity, professionalism, cooperation, and respect, and we will continue to demonstrate that the trust and confidence Canadians have placed in our administration is well founded.

Date modified:

2013-11-06