Senator Dupuis: Senator Gold, in that same report from April 2022, the Commissioner concludes that the department incorporated Gender-based Analysis Plus when designing these programs and has collected related data from project proponents, but it hasn’t systematically evaluated or reported on the results. This makes it difficult to track the extent to which programs are making progress, or not, on the government’s equality commitments.

Does the department intend to address this oversight in Gender-based Analysis Plus in the projects it funds? When and how will the department conduct the evaluation? How do the projects it funds help achieve this government’s commitment and when will it report on them?

Hon. Renée Dupuis: My question is for the Government Representative in the Senate.

Senator Gold, in his Report 4 on the audit of Infrastructure Canada’s funding of climate-ready infrastructure released on April 4, 2022, the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development found, among other things:

 . . . because the department did not integrate Canada’s commitments to meeting the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals into the design of its programs, it did not monitor or report on whether the programs were contributing to these goals.

Why did the department not include targets and indicators into the design of its programs to measure how it contributes or not to achieving the UN’s sustainable development goals by 2030?