Auditor general halts audit of Yukon's nominee program, citing RCMP investigation

Canada's auditor general has put its audit of the Yukon's nominee programs on hold, citing an ongoing RCMP investigation involving the department that oversees those programs.

In a letter last week to MLA Currie Dixon, chair of the territory's standing committee on public accounts, deputy auditor general Andrew Hayes says his office had originally planned to present its performance audit report on the Yukon Nominee Program and Yukon Business Nominee Program next fall.

Now, he says, further audit work is being indefinitely postponed "out of respect for any ongoing investigations that are being conducted by the RCMP."

Last June, RCMP executed a search warrant for information held at the territory's Department of Economic Development office in Whitehorse but provided no other details.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Premier Ranj Pillai — who's also the territory's Economic Development minister — also had little to say about the ongoing police investigation, except that he believed it involved the Yukon Nominee Program.

"My earlier sense of this was that it did not have to do with operational activities, but potentially clients of the department," Pillai said.

"We're waiting to see what the RCMP is gonna say and we're fully co-operating with whatever they need. And I know that's what the department's been doing right from the start."

The Yukon Nominee Program is meant to help businesses fill vacant jobs by bringing skilled workers to the territory. Hundreds of people apply for a limited number of spots under the program each year.

In his letter last week, the deputy auditor general said his office was still conducting "exploratory work to finalize the scope" of its audit when it learned of the RCMP search in June.

"There is significant likelihood that information that is relevant and necessary for our audit will not be available to us at this time because of the search warrant," Hayes wrote. 

While the audit is on hold, Hayes said his office would in the meantime provide the Department of Economic Development with some "high-level issues" already identified in its exploratory work, as well as some ideas for how those issues might be addressed.