44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 27, 2024 10:00AM
- Feb/27/24 10:31:32 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, yes I will: We will cut arrive scam. We are going to cut the $21 billion given to high-priced consultants, which has gone up by 100%, doubling under the government. We will cut the $35-billion Canada Infrastructure Bank that has not built any infrastructure. We are going to cut the billion-dollar green fund that has not actually delivered any green technology, of which $150 million has already been misplaced and misappropriated. I could go on, but I am being extremely specific because it is so easy to list the waste that we would cut.
The member said that all of these things, axing the tax, building the homes, fixing the budget and stopping the crime, should be made into bumper stickers. They will be made into bumper stickers because we have a very easy-to-understand, common-sense agenda, and there will be vehicles right across this country that will share that agenda. He said that it is hidden. How could it possibly be hidden if it is going to be on a bumper sticker?
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- Feb/27/24 10:32:39 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the Conservative members are all worked up. I get it. Today is their opposition day.
I am going to try to ask the Conservative leader a direct question, but I have no illusions. I do not expect an answer because he plays exactly the same political games as the Prime Minister: He refuses to answer difficult questions and tosses around political slogans. Still, I will give it a try.
When the member for Carleton was parliamentary secretary to the minister of transport, from 2011 to 2013, his department awarded $6.5 million to the owners of GC Strategies, the same persons currently involved in the ArriveCAN matter, but operating under a different name back then.
Could the Conservative leader tell us what that money was used for and how it was spent?
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- Feb/27/24 10:33:24 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we are prepared to look at all of the contracts given to individuals and businesses. There was no arrive scam at the time. We could not foresee that, 12 or 13 years later, there would be a scandal involving a business operating under another name. I know that the former Conservative government did spend the money, but I would add that, during the years he is talking about, we were spending half as much on outside consultants. We were spending less on bureaucracy, less on outside consultants.
Yesterday, I was in Saguenay. People wanted to know why this member of Parliament votes for the Prime Minister and against the interests of Saguenay. He votes for higher taxes on gas and diesel for trucks. He votes for higher taxes on small businesses. He votes for all of the Liberal government's inflationary spending, including all the arrive scam spending.
He should have stood up and apologized to his constituents for having voted to throw their money out the window in support of the Prime Minister's arrive scam.
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- Feb/27/24 10:34:47 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I want to start with this: It was actually the Conservative government that cut IT staff in the public service. We saw outsourcing go up with the big six companies; it doubled under the Conservatives. We saw it quadruple under the current Liberal government. It has become unequivocally clear that the corporate-controlled parties, both Liberal and Conservative, are continuing to go to the highly paid private sector to give it taxpayer dollars to provide services that could be provided by the public service.
We put forward a motion, as New Democrats, to expand the study beyond ArriveCAN, as we know GC Strategies started doing business with the government under the Harper regime. We asked to expand it to look at all outsourcing, including Deloitte, which went from $97 million doing contracts with the Government of Canada to $275 million. My question to the Conservative leader is this: Why is it that the Conservatives will not let us expand the study? It has been a year since the motion passed. Is it because Peter MacKay is a director at Deloitte or is it because Pierre Pettigrew is a director at Deloitte? We know that it is the corporate-controlled parties that are blocking us from having a real look at what is going on—
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- Feb/27/24 10:36:16 a.m.
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We are out of time. I will allow the hon. leader to answer.
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- Feb/27/24 10:36:18 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, let us start with “corporate-controlled”. The NDP-Liberal government is corporate-controlled. It voted together, including that member, to double the amount of money spent on outside consultants. He voted to increase outsourcing by $11 billion, 100%. He voted to make his constituents on Vancouver Island spend $1,400 per household on outside consultants.
Conservatives voted against every single nickel of that outsourcing. We are the only party in the House that can say that. All three costly coalition parties voted for those things. We are going to cut the outsourcing. We are going to save the money. We are going to deliver common sense for the common people by axing the tax, building the homes, fixing the budget and stopping the crime.
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- Feb/27/24 10:37:26 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, today we are introducing a motion for debate in the House. This motion invites all sitting members from all parties, the 338 members of the House of Commons, to do some serious soul-searching.
Let us think back to the pandemic. Let us think back to the report that the Parliamentary Budget Officer released after the pandemic. He said that there had been $500 billion in COVID-specific spending, but he could not explain where $200 billion of it had gone. In the report, he says that, although spending was needed during the pandemic, there were amazingly few controls. This first report highlighted something very important. He was unable to explain $200 billion in spending. We may now even be able to see that some of the remaining $300 billion in spending was a bit fishy.
Another very important person involved in scrutinizing what happens to public funds is the Auditor General of Canada. Last year, the Conservative Party asked the House to vote. In November 2022, the Auditor General was asked to investigate ArriveCAN. ArriveCAN seemed a little strange from the start. It is a tool intended to track people's movements and obtain information on their vaccination status. In theory, it should not have cost much. However, we eventually became aware that something was wrong. It was costing a lot of money to create something that should not have been all that complicated. When certain information was brought to light, particularly concerning contracts with some odd people, it was decided that an investigation was in order.
The Auditor General did her job. She spent almost a year and a half trying to get answers. Let us put ourselves in the shoes of Canada’s Auditor General, who is appointed to work independently to verify and examine everything concerning the administration of public funds in relation to a particular file. She released her report two weeks ago, saying she was discouraged and was unable to carry out her work. From what she could see, at least $60 million was spent on this app, but it could have been more, because she could not find the supporting documentation. She could not find the contracts. When she did find an invoice, there were no details. It simply listed an amount of a few million dollars, and the cheque was sent out. She was really depressed to see how public funds were handled in this file.
In addition to the Auditor General, the procurement ombud did his own analysis, and our motion today mentions that too. He released a report a week or two ago, stating that 76% of the companies involved in the ArriveCAN file had performed no work. That means that $45 million was paid to people who did not even do any work. It is one scandal after another. When the Auditor General's report was released, I said it was the tip of the iceberg. I was sure more would be found and that this was not over.
Today, we want to shed light specifically on ArriveCAN. We have a great deal of information showing that there was outright corruption. At what level was the corruption happening? Who did it? How did they do it? We do not know, but we want to know. That is why we need to get to the bottom of this matter. I expect everyone in the House to support the motion that the Conservative Party is putting forward today. There is nothing remotely political about the Conservative Party's motion. It is a motion containing three specific points with specific queries about documents. This is simply an effort to shed light on the matter, so that the House can get the documents and information necessary to understand what went on in with ArriveCAN.
Last week, I sat on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. The Auditor General was there. The deputy minister of procurement and the assistant deputy minister of departmental oversight also attended. I asked the latter, whose office is in charge of oversight, a question concerning ArriveCAN, and she did not know what to say. She started giving me a vague answer. I told her that I did not want a written answer that did not mean anything. I wanted a real answer. I asked a question, which appears in the record of the meeting. I asked her if, when she heard about this issue a year and a half ago, everyone in her office started banging their heads against the wall wondering what was going on.
We could see that no one really knew what was going on. Another thing to take into account is that there are people in offices who have specific oversight functions, but still do not know what is going on or, in any case, do not appear to know or do not want to know. I do not know what to make of all this. The point is that the federal government’s overall management of public funds is troubling. As I mentioned earlier, this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Let us keep in mind that the Parliamentary Budget Officer did not even know where $200 billion of the budget deficit had gone. We are now dealing with the ArriveCAN scandal, an app that cost $60 million when it should have cost $80,000. There are a lot of questions about government spending in general.
We also learned other very important facts. Minh Doan, the Prime Minister’s chief information officer at the Information, Science and Technology Branch, apparently deleted tens of thousands of emails concerning ArriveCAN. Why would he have deleted tens of thousands of emails documenting discussions between the people who were managing ArriveCAN if there was nothing to hide? That is another problem we have to solve. That is one of the reasons why the House of Commons needs to examine this issue in depth.
This morning we learned something else about the member for Québec, the current Minister of Public Services and Procurement. During COVID-19, he was the president of the Treasury Board and therefore responsible for issuing contract management directives. I even asked him some questions at the time at the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates about contract management. The minister did not seem to know how to answer. He often offloaded questions to his deputy minister. Since last summer's cabinet shuffle, he is now the Minister of Public Services and Procurement. According to La Presse, the minister's briefing book contained some sensitive items. The minister was told to pay attention to the shipbuilding strategy with Davie, the F-35 file and other issues. However, there were no notes about ArriveCAN. At the time, the Auditor General was conducting an investigation into a matter related to the procurement of federal government contracts. The ArriveCAN file was not even part of the minister's briefing. He was not even told to pay attention to it or that it was a sensitive issue. That is another question that needs to be explored. Why is it that when someone leads a department, they do not get any notes on a file that is being investigated by the Auditor General? There are so many questions, which is why our motion is very clear.
I will close by referring to the mandate letter issued to the member for Québec when he was president of the Treasury Board. In the mandate letter, the Prime Minister clearly states:
I also expect us to continue to raise the bar on openness, effectiveness and transparency in government. This means a government that is open by default. It means better digital capacity and services for Canadians. It means a strong and resilient public service. It also means humility and continuing to acknowledge mistakes when we make them.
That last sentence is what I would like to hear from the government. I would like it to acknowledge that it made mistakes. Since the tabling of the Auditor General's report, we have yet to hear the government express a modicum of regret. On the contrary, it tries to put it off, saying it will do better in the future. These mandate letters are useless because all we see is scandals and the government does not seem to want acknowledge the truth.
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- Feb/27/24 10:46:36 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, when the member talks about accountability, what he has said is not really true. We need to put this into perspective with respect to what was taking place in a worldwide pandemic. Governments around the world were responding as much as they could. In Canada, I would like to think that we provided the types of supports that Canadians and businesses required, and there were all kinds of government expenditures.
We have a civil service, which is second to no other, and there is a process that needs to be followed, particularly for procurement. When the government has been made aware of issues related to it, it has been very transparent about it. Internal work has been done. Things have been been pointed out by the Auditor General, and the government is working to rectify those issues.
Is it not a responsible way for a government to react when it finds out, to take specific actions? That is exactly what this government has done.
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- Feb/27/24 10:47:42 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, to answer my colleague's question, I have here the transcript of a committee meeting that I attended on June 16, 2021.
At that meeting, I asked a question about an April 2020 memorandum indicating that Treasury Board would be relaxing the rules for awarding contracts to speed up the process during the pandemic.
In June 2021, the worst was over. We were regaining control. I asked the committee if we could take back control, and I was told that there were too many important investments to make and so on.
We were already asking questions at that point and we could see that there were things that were not working. We understand that the situation was complicated at the beginning of the pandemic. However, after a year, we could also see that we needed to take back control. There were also other questionable contracts, but I will not get into that right now.
Something went wrong. That much is clear.
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- Feb/27/24 10:48:39 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I enjoy debating with my colleagues. We may not always share the same opinions, but I enjoy a debate based on facts.
Since 2015, the Bloc Québécois has voted against every Trudeau government budget and every Trudeau government economic statement.
Knowing this, when the Conservatives say that the Bloc Québécois supports all of the Trudeau government's spending, would my colleague, hypothetically, without naming names, agree with—
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- Feb/27/24 10:49:07 a.m.
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This is the third time. I would like to remind the member that we must say the Liberal government or use another wording.
The hon. member for Lac‑Saint‑Jean.
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- Feb/27/24 10:49:16 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I apologize.
The Bloc Québécois has not supported any of this government's budgets or economic statements.
I would like to ask a question of my colleague, who is a respectable man.
If a politician—and I am not naming names—were to say that the Bloc Québécois supports all of this government's spending, would he not be shamelessly lying to the public?
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- Feb/27/24 10:49:45 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I will answer my colleague by saying that, with respect to the issue being discussed today, the Bloc Québécois voted for the appropriations, knowing full well that they were intended for ArriveCAN. There were two separate appropriations of $12.5 million each.
That is why it is so strange to see the members of the Bloc Québécois react by saying that what they voted for is scandalous. The House leader of the Bloc Québécois said that that was normal, that they did not have time to look at everything and that the money had to go out. That is what happened.
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- Feb/27/24 10:50:18 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we saw outsourcing to highly paid consultants double under the Conservatives, including GC Strategies owners, who were formerly operating under another company. We saw the Conservatives bring in the Phoenix pay system. It was supposed to save $80 million, but it has cost $3.5 billion. Therefore, we cannot give credit to the Conservatives that they are going to lead the path with respect to taking on highly paid consultants.
I brought forward a motion at the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates a year ago to expand the study to include the big six corporations. We saw Deloitte go from $97 million last year to $275 million this year. In fact, it did $11 million worth of business in Canada in 2015 and now it is up to $275 million. However, it did not want to look at it. Why? Because the corporate controlled parties have a former Liberal cabinet minister, Pierre Pettigrew, as a managing director. They have a former Conservative cabinet minister, Peter MacKay, as a managing director.
When will the Conservatives stop protecting their former ministers and their Conservative insiders, and will they start taking a look at all of the outsourcing and actually try to fix this problem?
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- Feb/27/24 10:51:47 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am happy to answer a question about Phoenix.
It is true that it was the Conservative government at the time that launched the project, because it would take time to change the payroll management system. However, let us recall that the Liberal government came to power in fall 2015 and that, in March 2016, it decided to activate the Phoenix system despite the fact that the deputy minister and everyone else told the government that the system was not ready and that there was still work to do. Since it was in a hurry, the government decided to activate the Phoenix system in March 2016. Consequently, we will not accept responsibility for deploying a system that was not ready. That decision was made by the Liberal government.
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- Feb/27/24 10:52:31 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by taking a moment to state that this government expects all public servants to act in the manner that represents the values and ethics code for the public service, including the obligation to serve public interests under the law.
I can also tell members that the CBSA is comprised of dedicated and talented employees who are united in this effort to improve processes and maintain Canadians' confidence and trust as they continue to deliver on their important mandate.
I would like to extend my thanks to the Auditor General and the procurement ombud along with their respective teams. They undertook a tremendous project to dig deep into the complex procurement activities as it unfolded for the development of the ArriveCAN app. Their efforts are not wasted, as they are shedding light on an important issue that has a widespread impact across government. Both have pointed to significant gaps and shortcomings in the procurement processes, record keeping, roles and controls at the CBSA. The agency has assured the government that these recommendations, as set out in both reports, will serve as goal posts to addressing the gaps and concerns raised.
The CBSA has accepted all the recommendations and has already started implementing action plans in response to the recommendations set out in the reports. These plans reflect the work of the CBSA that it has already undertaken to date and the work it will be doing moving forward to ensure that all of its procurement actions are aligned with policies and processes, that the CBSA continues to operate transparently, that it has stronger regard for the value for money when outsourcing work and that all employees operate in a manner consistent with the CBSA code of conduct and public sector values and ethics.
Most notably, the CBSA has so far created the executive procurement review committee to approve contracts and task authorizations. This is providing more oversight on the contracting activities. Second, it will require employees to disclose interactions with potential vendors, which will increase transparency. Third, the CBSA has increased the capacity of its procurement group both to oversee procurement activities and establish a centre of expertise. It will act as a single window to help employees if they have questions or do not understand their authorities and obligations.
These examples are just a starting point of the CBSA, which continues to implement the action plans in response to the Auditor General's recommendations.
The CBSA recognizes that maintaining the trust of Canadians is paramount and will endeavour to do so by improving its internal management and ensuring that public policies are followed. Canadians deserve to have trust in their institutions and in the public service.
The CBSA is working with Public Services and Procurement Canada to improve its procurement practices to ensure strengthened controls, oversight and stewardship over contracting. So far, these discussions have led to its new procurement improvement plan. The agency already started to strengthen its processes and controls related to procurement planning, contract administration, corporate culture and proactive monitoring to reduce the risk of fraud, and more is to be done.
The CBSA is responding quickly to move forward in the right direction. One of the steps taken involved launching an internal audit of all contracting at the agency. It has also increased its oversight over the issuing of contracts and task authorizations. The CBSA is also now requiring employees with contracting authority to retake procurement certification courses.
Although these are simple steps, they will certainly improve the stewardship of contract administration within the agency, while still providing critical services to Canadians across the country.
I would like to use my time to also addressed concerns that have been raised around the value-for-money aspect of ArriveCAN, with the acknowledgement that the gaps in policies and controls existed in the procurement process. We do have to remember that the paper system was slow and costly and was not meeting the information requirements of public health officials. While we cannot disregard the very legitimate concerns raised in the Auditor General and procurement ombud reports over these allegations, there are still some positive aspects of the ArriveCAN app.
Last week, the AG appeared before the Standing Committee on Public Accounts and said that she does not think the value should be quantified. She acknowledged that there was some value in digitizing the old paper system at the border. The OAG's 2021 report on border measures covered this as well. I will quote from the AG's appearance last week.
I would add that there is also an enduring value to this application, as CBSA has now springboarded off what was done here to automate the border, something they had been working on before the pandemic. They used this as a sort of springboard to go there. There is some sort of enduring value left, post its use during the pandemic.
On this side of the aisle, we can agree that things could have unfolded a lot better. I do note that the pandemic context is an incredible management challenge, but this is absolutely no excuse to throw policy and procedure out the window. What we have learned in that regard is unacceptable, and I am glad to see that CBSA is taking that very seriously.
Across government, departments were called upon to be fast and flexible in providing services to Canadians, but this bias to action should not have come at the price of sound stewardship. Then, as now, public servants need to remain focused on documenting decisions and taking care of basic management fundamentals.
I can report that the CBSA has already made changes to address this, and we will take further action to ensure management practices are aligned with policies and deliver value for money going forward.
In order to avoid restrictive requests for proposals, the agency's new executive procurement review committee will look at the mandatory criteria in contracts to ensure that they are not overly restrictive. In addition, contracts above $1 million need to be approved by the CBSA's executive committee to ensure they do not undermine the fairness and openness of the bid solicitation process.
The CBSA is reinforcing government spending requirements and has already curbed its use of management consultants. The CBSA will continue to adjust our procurement governance and supporting documents so that they act as a quality control process to ensure mandatory criteria are not overly restrictive and do not undermine the fairness and openness of the bid solicitation process.
A culture change in procurement is happening and is necessary. I think that all members can agree that federal procurement is difficult to understand, but we can all understand that it needs to be done properly.
Again, we would like to thank the Auditor General and the procurement ombud for their work. These reports, along with the work of various standing committee studies on this matter mean that Canadians can rest assured that procurement in Canada is being examined and the results should be a positive net gain for taxpayers as we think of what kind of work we outsource and how.
I have acknowledged that we need to get to the bottom of what happened in this case, and we can also ensure that we tighten procedures to prevent the procurement process from any wrongdoing in the future. I think all parliamentarians should be concerned about the details of this situation.
However, after listening to several speeches already in this House today, I do question the sincerity of the Conservative Party, which will say anything to grab power. Their actions do not actually match the tough talk that they often speak in this place. With my remaining time, I would like to demonstrate to Canadians that while we are deeply committed to fixing the procurement process, the tough talk of Conservative members in this place is all talk and not actually based in reality. I think Canadians need to get a picture of how deep this procurement issue goes.
In questions, my hon. colleagues have raised the fact that GC Strategies, which is at the heart of this issue, went by a different name previously, or merged from, Coredal Systems Consulting Inc.. With the remainder of my time, I would like to read into the record all of the contracts issued by the previous Conservative government using this very same company that it now claims to be Liberal insiders.
They include the following: April 1, 2015, total value over $541,000 for technology consultants; March 3, 2014, over $2.3 million for consultants and a programmer-analyst for Transport Canada while the Leader of the Opposition served as parliamentary secretary; March 26, 2013, over $1.8 million for Transport Canada; November 28, 2012, over $287,000 for management consulting; October 29, 2012, over $968,000 for telecom consultants; October 17, 2012, over $140,000 for other professional services not elsewhere specified; October 17, 2012, over $233,000 for other professional services not elsewhere specified; March 29, 2012, over $213,000 for management consulting; March 1, 2012, $675,000 for information technology consultants; August 9, 2011, over $24,000 for training consultants.
It continues: July 29, 2011, over $24,000 for a sole-source contract for IT consultants at the same company that the Conservatives claim does not do any IT work as I am reading out all of the IT contracts that they approved; July 29, 2011, over $24,000 for sole-source contracts for Transport Canada; May 24, 2011, over $129,000 for Public Works and Government Services, for a procurement tool; and October 26, 2010, over $21,000 for management consulting at Fisheries and Oceans.
Although this issue is deeply concerning, in regard to what happened here, we can see that the procurement issues are pervasive and it is why this review is absolutely necessary. It is why we committed to doing the work to fix the procurement process to put in better oversight and transparency. However, when Conservatives talk tough, Canadians should know that their actions are very different.
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- Feb/27/24 11:05:55 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I heard my colleague make some quotes about $24,000 contracts and $100,000 contracts. This is a $20-million middleman contract. It is absurd and it was done with no accountability, no contracts and nothing of any sort to show what the money was for. It was a shovelling of taxpayer money into the pockets of a few chosen so-called IT consultants who are really just middlemen. It is something that is beyond the realm of what Canadians see as acceptable. Would my colleague please address the fact that this needs to be explored; but also explain to the House why her party filibustered, obfuscated and tried to hide this from Canadians for almost two years?
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- Feb/27/24 11:06:52 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, we did no such thing. While the member opposite stands up and defends his party's record, let me just point out again April 1, 2015. While his leader sat around the cabinet table, their government approved $541,000 in IT, technology and telecommunications consultants for the very same company that the Conservatives are criticizing.
I acknowledge that there is a need to get to the bottom of what happened here and to fix the procurement process, but when Conservatives talk with outrage, we should know that it is very fake, given their record. I would ask for unanimous consent to table, in both official languages, the Coredal-Conservative contracts in this House so the members opposite can see just how much money they spent.
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- Feb/27/24 11:07:43 a.m.
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- Feb/27/24 11:07:48 a.m.
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Does the hon. member have consent?
Some hon. members: No.
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