Auditor General Karen Hogan is refusing to disclose the questions her office used to test the accuracy of Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) call centres, citing official secrecy — even though a past auditor released similar information in a previous audit.Hogan’s office said it would not publish the 167 questions used by auditors posing as taxpayers, despite public interest in how her team concluded that CRA agents gave accurate information only 17% of the time. “All the information we can share publicly has been included in the report,” said spokesman Sébastien Bois. Hogan also declined to release the material under the Access To Information Act, without explanation.Blacklock's Reporter said the October 23 audit found widespread errors among CRA call centre agents, who were tested with general tax and benefit inquiries. "We found agent responses to individual tax questions were accurate only 17% of the time,” Hogan said in her report..CRA Commissioner Bob Hamilton told MPs he was surprised by the findings, saying the agency’s internal checks showed a far higher success rate. “According to our results, these calls achieved an accuracy rate of 94% and the Auditor General confirmed this higher rate,” Hamilton said during testimony to the Commons public accounts committee. “We’re paying attention to that.”Hamilton added that CRA has been monitoring 100,000 recorded calls annually since 2018 to assess performance. He said the agency is studying Hogan’s audit “to identify some places for improvement.”Despite repeated requests, Hogan has refused to release the specific questions used in the audit. That’s a sharp contrast to a 2017 audit by the late Auditor General Michael Ferguson, who voluntarily published several sample questions. His report detailed examples such as: “When will interest begin to be charged on my initial assessment?” and “When do I need to inform the Agency of the change in my marital status for the Canada Child Benefit?”
