Budget Oversight Exchange Visit in China

Technical Resource Materials
	TORs, Itinerary and Participant lists for the Exchange Visit
Presentations delivered to budget staff of the Inner Mongolia and Jiangsu People’s Congress: (available soon on our website)
	“Budget Consultation in British Columbia” prepared by Robert Vaive, Clerk Assistant, BC Legislative Assembly
	“Accountability Partners - Office of the Auditor General of Ontario and the Standing Committee on Public Accounts” Prepared by: Douglas Arnott, Senior Committee Clerk and Cleark of the Standing Committee on Fiance and economic Affairs ， Ontario Legislative Assembly
	“Accountability and Oversight in the BC Budgetary Process” Prepared by Susan Ryan, Manager, Estimates, Fiscal Planning and Estimates Branch, Treasury Board Staff , British Columbia

From 27 th November – 4 th December, 2006, the Parliamentary Centre organized a technical assistance mission in selected Chinese provinces in collaboration the Budget Affairs Commission of the National People’s Congress (NPC). The purpose of the mission is to improve awareness of the budget staff of the Provincial People’s Congress to conduct budgetary review and scrutiny of public accounts. An team of Canadian experts was put together to provide hands-on guidance for building essential oversight mechanisms into the all stage of budget planning and implementation.

This mission brought together a team of Canadian budget practitioners to undertake exchanges with selected Chinese provinces. The major content of the knowledge transfer included:

1. demonstration of the accountability mechanisms underlying various stages of the Canadian budgetary process, as manifested from practices of the parliamentary, governmental and auditing agencies, and various techniques that support the functioning of these mechanisms;
2. illustration of templates and examples of budget plan or departmental estimates with a visual revelation on how oversight mechanisms, in practice, are built into the early stage of resource planning that enables tracking and traceability throughout the implementation and reporting cycles;
3. introduction of various tools and methods available to Canadian practitioners and assessment of their relevancy and usefulness for strengthening the role and capacity of the provincial People’s Congress in budget oversight;
4. exchanges with local professional staff on how to improve the transparency and representation in budgetary decision-making through public involvement, particularly the engagement of socially disadvantaged groups, in the budget planning and evaluation.

This mission is the first opportunity for the Parliamentary Centre to have direct engagement with Chinese provincial congresses in the field. Two Chinese provinces - Inner Mongolia and Jiangsu - have been chosen by the NPC as the locations where most technical exchanges took place. Together, these two provinces represent two distinctive stages of development - Jiangsu comes as one of the most dynamic economic powerhouses of the country while Inner Mongolia, on the other hand, ranks below average in terms of its economic wealth. The population in Inner Mongolia, one of China’s five ethnic autonomous regions, is characterized by more diverse ethnic composition than that of Jiangsu. Thus the two jurisdictions showcase varying combinations of issues, challenges and priorities for development that need to be taken into consideration by the policymakers in making budgetary decisions. The different contexts were reflected in the focuses of exchanges in these provinces.

The knowledge and insights shared by the Canadian delegation were well received by staff members and experts from the local People’s Congresses, the Audit Offices and the Department of Finance. On all occasions where the delegation made formal presentations, their local counterparts paid great attention and interests in listening to their introduction on Canadian experiences and practices, and asked questions, in some cases, discussed in detail about issues and areas of common interests. During and after the exchange presentations and discussions, it was usual that Chinese counterparts will discuss amongst themselves in a heated way, signalizing much interest in the Canadian experiences, and the comparative perspectives. For most of the official activities, the facilitators had to exercise rigorous control on the overall timing as there were many questions sparked by the presentations on both Canadian and Chinese experiences.

Three senior officials were brought from the parliament and government of British Columbia and Ontario to present different and complementary elements of the Canadian experiences in strengthening oversight in the budgetary cycle including preparation, design, approval, implementation and monitoring. These have provided their Chinese counterpart with valuable insights into the Canadian system and practices. On the Chinese side, presentations were equally well prepared by staff members from not only the Finance and Economics Affairs Commissions, but also staff members from the Department of Finance and the Audit Office, to present a rather comprehensive framework on the budgetary work at provincial levels in China.