OECD review of the Canadian Parliamentary Budget Office

Acknowledgements

This OECD Review was prepared by the Public Governance Directorate (GOV) of the OECD under the leadership of Elsa Pilichowski, Director for Public Governance, and overall supervision of Jón Blöndal, Head of Public Management and Budgeting Division. The Review was authored by Scherie Nicol (Lead – Independent Fiscal Institutions). The Review also benefited from contributions by Anthony Close (formerly of the Victorian Parliamentary Budget Office), Jeffrey Novak (Ontario Financial Accountability Office), and Bert Smid (Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis), as well as feedback from the OECD’s Working Party on Parliamentary Budget Officials and Independent Fiscal Institutions.

The authors appreciate the views and support of the Canadian Parliamentary Budget Office throughout the Review process, including Jason Jacques (Interim Parliamentary Budget Officer), Chris Matier (Director General of Economic and Fiscal Analysis), Mark Mahabir (Director General of Costing and Budgetary Analysis, and General Counsel), and Sloane Mask (Chief Operating Officer), as well as the views of external stakeholders who provided input.

Corey Stenhouse provided logistical support, and Meral Gedik provided publication support.

OECD work on independent fiscal institutions

Independent fiscal institutions (IFIs) represent a major innovation in public financial management. They are an essential pillar of many countries’ fiscal setup.

The OECD has been bringing together IFIs through its Working Party of Parliamentary Budget Officials and Independent Fiscal Institutions (PBO Working Party) since 2009. The PBO Working Party seeks to identify and share good practices and to set standards for IFIs across Member countries. It developed the 2014 OECD Recommendation on Principles for IFIs, which includes a provision on the need for IFIs to undergo external evaluations. The logic behind this is simple – independence requires accountability. Just as IFIs help hold governments accountable, they have a special duty to be accountable as well. The Review presented here is part of a series of IFI external evaluations and was commissioned at the request of the Interim Parliamentary Budget Officer in September 2025. It represents the first external review of the PBO.