44th Parl. 1st Sess.
November 1, 2022 10:00AM
- Nov/1/22 10:16:40 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, no, they are not, but they may well be. In fairness, Napoleon said to never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence. That is a plausible theory for the government. At the same time, we need to know the truth.
When $54 million goes out the door and government officials cannot get their stories straight about where it went, the least we can do is to have an audit. Put the Auditor General in charge. Look into these costs. Find out who got the money, who got rich and why we spent $54 million on an app that could have been designed for a quarter of a million dollars.
Why did we waste this money when Canadians are paying so much? How could the government be so out of touch? We need answers. We need the truth. Support this motion and let us get to that truth.
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- Nov/1/22 11:27:17 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise this morning to speak to the opposition motion before us.
I think everyone in the House would agree that one of the most important responsibilities of the government, which some would say is a sacred responsibility, is stewarding public funds and ensuring that every single dollar is spent in the best interests of Canadians, that the government gets maximum value and that public contracts do not excessively line the pockets of private companies. That is why the motion calling for the Auditor General to conduct an audit of all aspects of the ArriveCAN app is so important and why Canadians should rightly be concerned.
There are a lot of different aspects we could talk about. We could talk about the fact that this app erroneously sent over 10,000 Canadians into quarantine and put them in jeopardy of $750,000 fines, or we could talk about the delays ArriveCAN caused at the border, something that was of great concern both to travellers and border officials. It made people struggle, especially people who did not have access to the technology. However, the focus of today's motion, and appropriately so, is on the decisions the government made around procurement to spend millions of dollars on private IT companies to develop and maintain this app.
The biggest concern is the lack of transparency around the cost of development and maintenance, and there are a number of things we know. First of all, we know the original estimate for developing the app was $80,000, and we know that somehow development and maintenance ballooned to $54 million. We also know the government paid an IT staffing firm here in Ottawa nine million of those dollars. This is a firm that has no office, has only a handful of staff and did not actually do the work, but rather assembled a team of contractors and took a 15% to 30% commission. They were making millions of dollars off this.
Finally, we know that when CBSA was asked to produce a list of all the contractors involved in the development and maintenance of the ArriveCAN app, there were a bunch of errors in that list. The original list included companies that had nothing to do with the ArriveCAN app, and when they saw their names on the list, they had some pretty serious questions for the government. A company called ThinkOn Incorporated and Ernst & Young were among the companies that had nothing to do with it and were quite confused by the fact they were being implicated. I appreciate that CBSA has promised to provide a full list and get to the bottom of these irregularities, but there are enough questions here that this motion to have the Auditor General conduct a full audit is very much warranted.
I also want to talk a bit about the broader questions this issue has brought up. There is a real question here about whether the government's overall approach to outsourcing is delivering good value for Canadians or whether it is simply lining the pockets of companies that have figured out how to maximize their returns from the system of government procurement.
We have heard concerns expressed by some of the public sector unions. They have shared with us that they believe IT companies are intentionally underbidding on government contracts. When they underbid on government contracts, it makes it very difficult for the government to assess whether it is in fact better value to outsource the contract to the private sector or whether better value is had by keeping that work in house with the government's own team of IT professionals. What happens after these companies underbid on the contracts is that the contracts start and they are able to have the contracts reopened.
While I am pausing, I note that I will be sharing my time with the wonderful member for Courtenay—Alberni, something I have been reminded of by my colleagues several times yet somehow have forgotten.
The reopening of these contracts then allows the government, on a discretionary basis, to jack up the value of those contracts again and again so that the total value at the end, when everything is said and done and all the dollars are added up, is many times higher than the original estimate for the work. This is something we need to get to the bottom of, and I think that is an opportunity the motion presents.
Here is the trend when it comes to government outsourcing. The Globe and Mail reported in January that the government outsourced $11.8 billion of work in the 2020-21 fiscal year. That is up 42% from 2015-16. It is a pretty alarming increase. In 2020-21, the federal government spent $2.3 billion on IT contracts, compared with only $1.9 billion on its own government IT workforce. One public sector union has filed 2,500 grievances related to outsourcing.
There is something wrong with this picture. We need to ensure this decision, which some people call the “make or buy” decision, is informed by the best information and that it is always done with the public's best interests in mind. Getting good value for taxpayers' dollars for the public resources that our government is charged with stewarding is the primary and only concern of that process.
I want to mention that, thankfully, the government operations committee is working on this larger topic right now, and I want to point out the good work of my colleague, the member for Courtenay—Alberni. It is looking at this broader question of whether the Treasury Board's guidelines, which are supposed to inform this make or buy decision, are doing a good enough job, are doing what they are tasked with doing and are ensuring that the public interest is protected.
Finally, I want to turn to one of the things I heard in the House yesterday, which I think is one of the unfortunate aspects of this debate over the ArriveCAN app. There is a common trope around IT work that I believe is neither accurate nor particularly helpful. Yesterday, we heard a Conservative member rise in the House and claim that ArriveCAN “could have been created by a bunch of pimply faced teenage hackers over a weekend using a Commodore 64.”
I hear my colleagues laughing. I agree that the quote is humorous, but it is an unhelpful stereotype and I will tell colleagues why. I used to work in IT as a website developer, and I came across the stereotype that we should not pay good money for IT work and for tech products. After all, these are things that our brother's cousin's nephew can do at home for fun. These are sophisticated technology products that are being developed, and IT workers in our country are among the most creative, the most sophisticated, the most sought-after and the most valuable assets we have. When we allow these tropes and stereotypes about IT work to persist, I think we really do them an injustice and potentially risk the future of the new economy that is so important in our country.
In conclusion, Canadians deserve to know that their taxpayer dollars are being managed responsibly. The irregularities around the ArriveCAN app raise serious questions and we need to get to the bottom of them. There is a larger question of whether the government's approach to outsourcing delivers value or whether it simply enriches its private sector friends. I hope through this debate and through the investigations and audits that follow we can get answers to those questions.
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- Nov/1/22 11:39:44 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I wish I knew the answer to that. I am hoping that is one of the things the Auditor General will help us get to the bottom of, and I am very interested in what those findings might be.
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- Nov/1/22 12:11:18 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, as the MP for New Brunswick Southwest, I know first-hand how harmful ArriveCAN was to the lives and livelihoods of Canadians.
My riding in southwest New Brunswick borders the state of Maine, in the United States of America. We have five international crossings, and many of these border points do not really feel like we are dealing with a foreign, distant government. This is because these cross-border communities were actually in place long before Confederation. These communities, with Maine residents on one side and New Brunswick residents on the other, have long lived together and shared services, including emergency services and community activity. When the border was closed, it had a devastating impact, and ArriveCAN was a poor solution.
There is a very good reason why the Auditor General should conduct a performance audit, including of the payments, contracts and subcontracts for all aspects of the ArriveCAN app, and good reason to prioritize that investigation. The ArriveCAN scam disrupted lives and family relations. It damaged the Canadian economy and infringed on mobility rights.
We have discovered that it was a costly government boondoggle rolled out by the Liberal government, which seems incapable of governing any federal institution in the country. Whether it relates to passport offices, the CRA or social programs, this is a government that just cannot shoot straight. It cannot govern well and, as a result, costs are going up everywhere.
This program, like many others, was a costly and unnecessary bureaucratic exercise. It was also heavy-handed and trampled over the guaranteed constitutional rights of Canadians. Millions were spent on a computer-based program and a mandate forcing all travellers, citizens and visitors alike, to register before entering Canada or, for citizens, coming home. Failing to do so could result in fines and/or a forced lock-up.
Independent software developers tell us that this app could have been built for less than a quarter of a million dollars. That would have been $250,000. It could have been completed in a weekend, but not in Ottawa, and not under this government. Instead, the Liberals spent an eye-popping $54 million and paid out millions to Liberal consultants. Of course, the government will not tell us who received those payments or who got rich.
My colleague from Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes spoke about the gross negligence that went toward the creation of the ArriveCAN scam. Regrettably, everything he said is true. The government said that one company was paid $1.2 million and then the company stood up and said that it had not received a dime. Where did that money go?
The Auditor General needs to investigate this because the government is not coming clean with the Parliament. It is not coming clean with Canadians.
This entire program is in desperate need of an audit, since Liberals will not tell the truth to Canadians. Canadians want to know what happened. Why was $54 million spent to control Canadians and strip away charter rights for a program that not only did not work but also was not necessary?
The Liberals, of course, cannot get their stories straight. We need an investigation. We need an audit.
Since the introduction of ArriveCAN and its subsequent mandatory use, I have been amazed by the lack of concern that the Liberal government has for the basic rights of Canadians. Anyone who is legally allowed to enter Canada, either as a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, under the Liberals, could now suddenly be denied re-entry into the country, through the threat of a fine of up to $5,000 and/or a 14-day quarantine because they did not register to come back into their own country.
The government requiring citizens to register as a condition of coming home is not something that we see in democratic and free countries, yet the government thought nothing of this infringement.
It was an infringement on charter rights, and there is no way around it or to explain away that citizens coming home could be fined for not following the government's rules. It was not just the invocation of the Emergencies Act that suspended civil liberties. ArriveCAN did the same to Canadians for a much longer time. Liberals believe theirs is the party of the charter, but this is difficult to square when we consider the actions they took while ArriveCAN was in place.
It is difficult to measure the economic impact on the Canadian economy, especially on the tourism sector, but we know there was a cost, and one part of my riding is quite a revealing example. Many members have long heard me talk about Campobello Island, a unique island, which is in New Brunswick. The only way on or off that island, year round, is over a bridge to Lubec, Maine.
This island has a population of only about 1,000 people, and it is especially popular with visitors from the United States because Campobello is home to the Roosevelt Campobello International Park. This was the summer home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the former American president, and his wife, Eleanor. It attracts tens of thousands of visitors from the United States every year in the summer, or at least it did before the Canada-U.S. border was closed, either because visitors were not allowed or because of the de facto closure with ArriveCAN.
According to my discussions with CBSA officials, of the American motorists who crossed onto Campobello from the state of Maine, for every three cars that arrived, two were returned to the state of Maine because the U.S. visitors were either not aware of ArriveCAN or had not completed it. It is estimated that between 25% and 50% of those visitors who were sent back did not bother to complete the ArriveCAN, did not come into Canada and just returned to Maine to go elsewhere.
I do not know if it was because of a lack of quality Internet in Lubec, because senior citizens are not familiar with apps and uploading medical documents or because these Americans just did not feel comfortable about uploading documents onto the database of a foreign country. However, if the Canadian government had been more reasonable from the start, it could have allowed CBSA officials to screen individuals at land crossings that enter our country and to do their jobs, but it did not.
Instead, it was a bureaucratic mess. It caused hardship to Campobello. It caused hardship to tourist operators across New Brunswick, as well as across Canada, and as it is with everything else, the government failed its task to run the country in a way that does not penalize Canadians and working Canadians.
Last week I was home in New Brunswick in Saint Andrews, after the Liberals had come back from a summer caucus meeting there, and I asked some of the operators how the season went. The answer was that it was great, once the Americans were allowed in at the end of the summer. It has an impact when we close the border and stopped allowing our American friends in.
ArriveCAN was a costly and flawed program, and there are many questions for the Auditor General to look at. If ArriveCAN requires one to take a PCR test and schedules pickup by the government's testing supplier, why were so many rural homes in my riding completely ignored for pickup? Why did the government not contract this pickup service to Canada Post and the rural post office carriers, so rural homes could be serviced? How many PCR tests were left outside homes on doorsteps for pickup and never collected? Why were children, who were ineligible for COVID vaccines, forced into quarantine because of random selections?
There are numerous questions the Auditor General should look at. If this motion passes, I intend to forward these questions to the Auditor General of Canada, and I hope the House votes to pass this, so we can get down and see what happened with the ArriveCAN scam.
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- Nov/1/22 1:05:26 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the best way to answer the question of the member for Winnipeg North question is to say that it is not me. The Auditor General will do her job; she is there for that. She is there to analyze each and every penny that the government spends.
On ArriveCAN, it is normal to have a system to evaluate the details of someone who is returning home, and we understand that, but why was it so difficult for everybody? My brother, who is an engineer, had difficulties with the app, like the hundreds of thousands of people who had to use it. The best person to answer that question is the Auditor General, and I am quite sure the member will support this motion.
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- Nov/1/22 1:09:10 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, to be brief, I totally agree with my colleague. We have a job to do. The Auditor General has a job to do, and I am sure everybody will ask the Auditor General to do her job.
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- Nov/1/22 1:36:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today to speak to this opposition day motion introduced by the Conservatives.
From the outset, I do not have an issue with the fact that the Conservatives are seeking accountability by asking the Auditor General to conduct some work. The premise of my concern is with respect to the preamble and the rhetoric that preludes the call on the Auditor General. That is what I will be focusing my time on.
For starters, I am concerned with the tone being suggested about such an important piece of infrastructure, which is this particular program for the security of Canada. We have members, like the member for Louis-Hébert who said moments ago that somebody could have made this for $200,000 in their basement. I believe those were his words.
Do we really want somebody working individually from their basement to create an app that holds such sensitive data as passport numbers and health information of not just Canadians but individuals around the world? Is that the standard by which we establish and set the quality of service that people visiting Canada and Canadians have come to rely on? I highly doubt it.
There is also the fact that the contract for ArriveCAN was not just about the creation over the weekend of an app. It was about multiple variations of it, changing the app, updating the app and maintaining the data. Let us think of the incredible amount of maintenance that was involved in this particular app on its own.
It is quite disingenuous when members get up in the House, namely Conservatives, like the member for Louis-Hébert did moments ago, and very haphazardly say that somebody could have created this app in their basement over the weekend. It is extremely disingenuous. They are heckling now, suggesting that they said they could do it. I am sure that a lot of people could say they could do it, but are these individuals who are qualified to handle such sensitive data?
Are these individuals who could properly put the required measures in place to make sure that data is secure and kept secure? That is the question. Are these individuals who have the ability to maintain that piece of a program for months and years to come so that it could properly be updated and protected against various threats? Of course not. It is extremely disingenuous to suggest that. At the end of the day, the members opposite know that.
What I find most interesting about this is that now we have the Conservatives saying that we did not need ArriveCAN and it was completely unnecessary. Let me read something from November 26, 2021. Conservatives do not want to hear this. They are already humming and hawing over it.
This is from the leader of the Conservative Party at the time. They have since given him the boot and gotten somebody else. He said, “Vaccines are the most effective tool to slowing the spread of known COVID-19 variants”. Do the Conservative members still support that? I would love to hear their input on that. That is a slight digression.
It goes on to say, “preventing serious illness, and ensuring that our economies from coast to coast to coast can stay open. As soon as COVID-19 began to spread, Canada’s Conservatives called on the...government to take action to secure the border and prevent the spread of the virus in Canada.”
This is the Conservatives. This was their former leader making that statement.
How about this from CTV News on April 22, 2021, again quoting the federal Conservatives and their then leader. With the words “Secure the Border” plastered behind him, the former Conservative leader “urged Canada to temporarily suspend all flights from COVID-19 hot spots.”
This is a quote:
“Canadians are being told not to go to work, not to send their children to school, but hundreds of international flights continue to land in Canada each week,” he said Thursday...“It is long past time for the [Prime Minister] to take action.”
This, again, is exactly what the former Conservative leader was saying. Now, they are suddenly saying that, when they said take action, they did not mean develop a way to prevent these people and to monitor these people coming to and going from the country. Do not forget, it was not that much later that the Conservatives suddenly started asking why the borders were not open.
The member for New Brunswick Southwest said earlier that he wanted his borders open and asked why his borders were not open?
What was their plan? Was it to just open the borders without any kind of safety measure? The Conservatives literally called on the government to bring in these safety measures. The government suspended those flights, brought in the safety measures and then gradually let people back into the country and that was not even good enough for them.
Here is another one from CTV on November 26, 2021. The member for Durham, the leader at the time, called on the Canadian government to issue travel advisories banning non-essential travel to and from countries like South Africa and Zimbabwe. The article says, “The party also wants to see mandatory screening at all international airports from affected countries, regardless of vaccination status and mandatory quarantine for all travellers from those countries.”
The member for Durham, the leader at the time, was literally calling on the government, in his words, for mandatory screening. How did they want to screen people? What was wrong with the piece of technology that was developed in order to screen them?
This is the hypocrisy that we are seeing from the other side. Earlier on, the Conservatives were saying to close the borders and set up tough measures to control people coming in. We brought in this app and then they suddenly changed their tune and asked, “Why are the borders not open and why do we have this silly app that we do not need?” That is the rhetoric that comes from the other side of the House.
I feel the most sorry for the New Democrats in this opposition day motion. They have been completely duped by the Conservatives. The first whereas clause in this motion says, “the cost of government is driving up the cost of living”. This is important because we heard in the opening comments by the Leader of the Opposition and the critic for finance that they were relating that specific clause to the increase in employees who work for the Government of Canada. That is what they said.
I asked the member for Courtenay—Alberni why he would support something like that. He said that they are talking about oil subsidies. I then asked the member for Calgary Midnapore whether she can confirm what that was exactly. She said it had to do with the rise in the number of employees who are working for the Government of Canada.
By supporting this motion, the NDP members are effectively agreeing with the Conservatives that the cost of government is driving up the cost of living and, by their own words, the Conservatives are referring to the number of employees who have been hired by the Government of Canada. That is not something that I would see the NDP in this House supporting.
The member for Edmonton Griesbach keeps standing up and talking about protecting public service jobs. He keeps getting up and asking that question. The very first whereas clause in this motion goes directly against that. They are critiquing and challenging those jobs, but the New Democrats have no problem voting in favour of it, even though it has that whereas clause in it.
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- Nov/1/22 3:06:44 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, because of this government's non-stop spending, inflation keeps rising and families in Quebec have to cope with ever-increasing bills.
Instead of spending prudently over the past few years, the government kept spending recklessly. For example, it sank $54 million into the pricey ArriveCAN app, an app that could have been developed over a weekend for $250,000. The difference is astounding.
When will the government do the right thing and refer this matter to the Auditor General of Canada so she can get to the bottom of this wasteful spending?
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- Nov/1/22 3:19:56 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is an honour to rise to speak to this great opposition day motion and I want to thank the Leader of the Opposition for moving it.
Many different things have happened over the last two or three years and that has brought us to where we are today, with a very particular focus on the ArriveCAN app. We need to show respect for taxpayer dollars, which is more fundamentally based on respect for the rights of our fellow Canadians.
An essential part of Parliament's role is to hold the government accountable for its spending along with its policy decisions regardless of the party that is in power. That is exactly what the motion calls for, nothing more. Hopefully all members from all parties in the House can agree with that idea, including Liberals who sit on the government side. We will have to wait and see the result of the vote, because the issue in question has to do with the controversial arrive scam app.
The motion calls for the Auditor General to conduct a performance audit, and that is something different from the House expressing our approval or disapproval toward a specific government policy. It is not even a committee study. Instead, this would be an independent review that would take the issue away from partisan debates between the government and the opposition.
It would address the need for some necessary accountability, though, because we cannot pretend that nothing really happened with the ArriveCAN app over the last two years. If government members are truly confident that they have made the right decisions along the way, then they should have no problem supporting the motion. In the end, it would prove their case with no problem, and I hope that point has been clearly understood.
We are here today, one month after the government eventually decided to drop the mandatory use of the ArriveCAN app, but that alone does not mean all issues have been resolved. We do not have the whole story, and many of the questions that Canadians have are left unanswered.
Why did the federal government mandate it in the first place? Why were Canadian citizens required to download and use an app to enter their own country? Why was there a lack of accommodation or flexibility? Why did it take so long for the government to finally drop the mandate? Why did it cost $54 million to create, when it has since been shown that it could have been made for as low as $250,000. It was originally projected to cost only $80,000. Who exactly benefited or profited from paying out all of these millions of dollars? This is what all members need to know on behalf of their constituents all across the country.
While we are having this debate, we also cannot forget all the impacts this mandated app has had on Canadians. The government has tried to claim that this was somehow about vaccination, to turn the issue against those who did not receive COVID vaccines. The reality is that we saw how this mandate affected different people regardless of their medical status. ArriveCAN took it a step beyond the other problems involved with vaccine mandates for work and travel. It created yet another barrier for new groups of people in our society, which relates to the technology used.
If the Liberals want to defend this decision by making it all about vaccines, then they are at least revealing part of the unfortunate truth by saying so. They have essentially admitted that their intention was to punish the unvaccinated, which came with the suggestion to the wider public that doing so would stop transmission. This might have worked to scapegoat and divide people during and after a snap election, but the mandate did not do what they said it would do. Of course, it is true that the app was clearly part of a broader policy that undermined and violated Canadians' right to medical privacy. What was the result?
Although the Prime Minister might not understand this fact, regular people have many reasons to travel besides taking luxurious vacations. These mandates devastated careers and relationships for people. Some of them were unvaccinated, while others did not disclose that they were vaccinated for privacy reasons, because that was the issue at stake. The government chose to keep it in place while it became more apparent over time that its excuse for it was flawed.
Again, the ArriveCAN requirement took all this to a new level. It made the situation more complicated and nonsensical. Some people could show their papers, but their personal circumstances did not allow for them to use ArriveCAN. Some did not have the right technology. Some just simply were not able to use it or maybe did not have ready access to it for practical reasons. In a lot of cases, we are talking about seniors or minorities who found that their government had added an arbitrary barrier under the vaccine mandate.
These are our fellow Canadians who live in my riding and in every other riding, including those belonging to Liberal members, and I am sure they have heard similar stories from constituents as I have.
For example, I had someone reach out to me by phone from one of the many Hutterite colonies. They do not use technology, do not have access to computers and their options for other access are limited. However, this individual was vaccinated and crossed the border into the United States, but upon returning to Canada was forced to quarantine simply because he was not using the ArriveCAN app and did not have the means to even have the app in the first place. It did not make any sense to him, and I agreed with him.
There are also a number of seniors in a similar situation who were forced to quarantine, even though they could otherwise prove their vaccination status under the rules. This had consequences that were more than a mere inconvenience. People were confined to their homes.
In the case of the constituent I mentioned, the community's lifestyle is based on agriculture and food production. This would have disrupted his ability to contribute to the important type of work that needs to get done. In fact, this constituent was down in the States getting the parts he needed for his agricultural machinery, his agricultural implements, to be able to perform what the government at the time had deemed to be an essential service, but he was told that he had to go home for 14 days anyway.
Farmers know they cannot afford to lose up to two weeks of valuable time. Their work, as we all know, is isolated by nature. There is one person driving a machine. Ranchers are out checking their cattle and herds. There is zero risk to the communities around them. This is another example of how the Liberals have zero understanding of what life is like in rural Canada.
Then it somehow got worse. Not only was the app intrusive, but it also had glitches. If people complied and used ArriveCAN, they still were not safe. There were people who were able and willing to use the app but who were still wrongly identified for quarantine time anyway. At one time, the Canada Border Services Agency said that these incorrect notifications went out to over 10,000 people. This is a disaster that was as embarrassing as it was confusing. It went right along with the government's failure to provide Canadians with passports and with notoriously bad flight disruptions at our airports, but the Liberals dragged it on nonetheless despite the calls to end it from border communities, tourism groups, border guard unions and the public. By the time they dropped this restriction, the travel season was all but over.
My riding is along the border we share with the United States, and tourism is an important part of our local economy. It also happens to be a rural area, which adds its own limitations to the situation. From that perspective, I can assure everyone there was real damage done to these communities because of these misguided policies. What makes it worse is we knew from common sense that the extra burden and impracticality for tourism, agriculture and other local industries was not necessary.
There were all kinds of Canadians who paid a price for the Prime Minister and the Liberal government to save face or score political points. Fortunately, the Liberals could not ignore the mounting pressure any longer and dropped the requirements at the border, which was the right thing to do. There are still some challenges remaining for our citizens and border communities. One such example is that the hours of operation still have not returned to normal.
A constituent of mine had a two-hour trip to make to the U.S. and back to get his cattle to the vet. It turned into a 14-hour trip because he was not allowed to come back over the border. There are regulations in this country that limit how long animals can be in a trailer, and this simple decision put him at risk. He had to spend even more time on the road away from home, risking the health of his animals as he was travelling.
Canadians can once again fully exercise the spirit of their charter right to remain in, enter or leave Canada. We also no longer restrict international travellers from coming here, but the United States still has a vaccine mandate at their border for our citizens. That is their decision to make. Our government obviously cannot make it for them. However, does the Prime Minister care to advocate and stand up for the same Canadians he has demonized and marginalized over the past two years?
The Liberals have not acknowledged what they did wrong. There has not yet been an expression of regret or apology. One way for them to show some goodwill would be to support this motion. There are a lot of strong opinions on these issues both inside and outside of Parliament, but if we at least agree to this, we could start to focus on getting more of the facts involved with a divisive policy.
That is something the Auditor General could provide. We could get a better idea of what happened and learn to do better in the future. Canadians could see some unity and leadership across party lines in this place. Hopefully, this would set a good example and help to heal the divisions we have in this country.
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- Nov/1/22 4:26:32 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, since I got vaccinated, I had a piece of paper that I could have shown customs officers. That would have cost the price of a sheet of paper, and it would have allowed me to cross the border.
Instead, everyone had to enter their information in the ArriveCAN app, otherwise they could not enter Canada. I had an app provided by the Quebec government that allowed me to show my proof of vaccination. Instead, the federal government wanted its own app, because it just had to get involved, or rather it wanted to reward good Liberal friends by handing out more valuable and juicy contracts.
That is why the Auditor General needs to get to the bottom of everything pertaining to the ArriveCAN app.
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- Nov/1/22 4:43:16 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Merriam-Webster dictionary defines “accountability” as “the quality or state of being accountable”, and further says, “especially: an obligation or willingness to accept responsibility or to account for one's actions”.
Does the member not think the Canadian public is expecting us to be accountable for the money that was spent on the ArriveCAN app? Who is better than the Auditor General to look into that?
I would also like her thoughts on how the present Liberal government has been lacking in accountability over the past seven years.
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- Nov/1/22 4:44:00 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, let us never forget that everyone in the House, everyone working here, is paid with taxpayer dollars.
That is why, as with any family budget, it is important to be accountable to the people who place their trust in us and whose taxes pay our salary, pay for this place and pay for all the services they then get back.
Demanding transparency and oversight is therefore perfectly legitimate, and the Auditor General of Canada is perfectly positioned to do that.
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