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ARCHIVED - RPP 2007-2008
Canada Revenue Agency
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Chapter 1 – Meeting Our Mandate
Agency Mandate
The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has the mandate to administer tax, benefit and other programs on behalf of the Government of Canada and provincial, territorial and First Nations governments.
Parliament created the CRA so we could meet the mandate by:
- providing better service to Canadians;
- offering more efficient and more effective delivery of government programs; and
- fostering closer relationships with provinces and other levels of government for which the CRA delivers programs, and providing better accountability.
The CRA’s mandate reflects the broad role that the Agency plays in the lives of Canadians. The CRA contributes to two of the Government of Canada’s Strategic Outcomes: Federal organizations that support all departments and agencies and Income Security and Employment for Canadians.
In December 2006, the Parliamentary Review of the CRA’s effectiveness as an Agency in meeting its mandate since 1999 was released. The report highlights some of the CRA’s successes and makes a number of recommendations. Over the course of the planning period, the CRA will respond to the recommendations and take steps to implement them appropriately.
A Strategic Perspective
Since becoming an agency in 1999, the CRA has placed an increasing emphasis on results-based management in order to ensure accountability for results. The Financial Administration Act requires us to produce a report on plans and priorities that states our corporate objectives, strategies to achieve those objectives and our expected performance.
We measure the results of our performance in administering tax and benefit programs against the CRA’s strategic outcomes (see the discussion starting on 
). We also measure our performance at the program
activity level, which provides an effective view of how our performance in specific activities affects the achievement of our strategic outcomes.
With this Report on Plans and Priorities, we are committing to develop a suite of indicators that will provide a high-level, strategic view of the context in which we work to meet our mandate.
We recognize that our success in providing service to government clients and Canadians is more than just the sum of our individual activities. Agency indicators situate CRA results in relation to Canadians’ expectations, Canada’s economic performance, and the contribution we make in conjunction with and on behalf of other governments throughout the country in maintaining Canada’s social and economic well-being.
It is important to recognize that the CRA cannot attribute overall results solely to its own activities. Our results are influenced by many external economic and legislative factors over which we have no control. As Canada’s principal revenue collector, we play a strong role in bettering the quality of life in Canada, but we also look to Canadians, to our partners and to other stakeholders for the role they play in safeguarding Canada’s social and economic well-being.
Agency Indicators
The value of the Agency indicators we are developing will be in analyzing and understanding trends, rather than in meeting specific targets. Trends provide the contextual information that will allow CRA management to assess changes in our operating environment, to analyze the risks and opportunities related to those changes, and to consider the potential impact on the CRA’s activities and performance.
Agency indicators will be presented according to five general categories: efficiency, effectiveness, service satisfaction, clients, and workforce satisfaction. These categories reflect key aspects of our mandate. Examples of proposed indicators, which are still under development, include a perspective on:
- the efficiency of our major activities by examining the costs for T1, T2, GST returns, and benefit payments; and
- the level of satisfaction expressed by taxpayers and benefit recipients, based on an index of key elements of the annual CRA Corporate Survey.