SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 286 - Feb/27/24

Feb/27/24 4:09:34 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the plank is in the eye of the person who just asked me if I could see the plank in mine. We did indeed vote against that, but it was a vote of non-confidence in this government because even then we already had doubts about its ability to manage public money, Canadians' money. My colleague's position is to defend the leader of the Bloc Québécois, who said, “We are not going to scrutinize everything the government spends. We just tell it to go ahead and hand out the money”. If that is how the Bloc Québécois is going to run a country, I think it is going to have a hard time balancing its budget.

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Ms. Lindsay Mathyssen (London—Fanshawe, NDP)

Feb/27/24 4:10:22 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, earlier, a Liberal member said that the Conservative government laid off nearly 37,000 federal public servants to finance its promised tax cuts, reducing the government's internal resources. The Conservatives are therefore responsible for the rising costs of outsourcing. I am curious. I would like to hear my colleague's suggestions about all the contracts and all the problems we are seeing now.

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Mr. Luc Berthold

Feb/27/24 4:11:11 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the problem is that the NDP blindly supports all of this government's financial decisions. There are more civil servants and there are more subcontractors. Unfortunately, services are worse than they were prior to 2015. Every Canadian in every riding can confirm this. People are lining up for passports. People are waiting months and weeks for Service Canada. People are waiting weeks for immigration. I think the NDP should show some restraint before they start throwing stones.

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Mr. Larry Brock (Brantford—Brant, CPC)

Feb/27/24 4:11:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I will start with a caveat. I have been involved in so many committees looking at this particular scam that it will be a real challenge to keep my comments to 10 minutes. I could literally speak for hours, but I am happy to highlight some of the important points today. I will start by reiterating our common-sense plan. As Conservatives, we will axe the tax, build the homes, fix the budget and stop the crime. After eight years, with a worn-out, tired Liberal-NDP government, Canadians have endured unprecedented levels of corruption. Today, we are debating the Conservative motion that calls on the Liberal government to table the full cost of the arrive scam app within 100 days from today's date and to reclaim all money that was paid to contractors and subcontractors who performed no work. This is the app, according to the Prime Minister, that should have cost the taxpayer $80,000, but now we have the Auditor General guessing at an amount of $60 million. It could be $70 million or $80 million. We do not know how much more than $60 million, but we do know that it is at least 750 times more than the original cost. I have been keeping track for several weeks now; several ministers, if not members of the backbench, have commented that, if the rules were broken and there was malfeasance or criminality, those responsible will be held accountable for their actions. What we have not heard at all is any minister, including the Prime Minister, indicating in the House that the buck stops with the government. Where was the Prime Minister? Where was the Minister of Public Services and Procurement?

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Mr. Larry Brock

Feb/27/24 4:14:25 p.m.
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Where were all those ministers for a period of three-plus years? Were they completely tone deaf? Were they completely derelict in their responsibility, asleep at the wheel? Were they simply complicit with fleecing the Canadian taxpayer of at least $60 million? Why is that important? It is because they need to look themselves in the mirror and say to Canadians that they did not provide the appropriate ministerial oversight. I have heard from deputy ministers and from several presidents of the impugned agencies, as laid out in the Auditor General's report. Every one of them confirmed regular, consistent, numerous discussions with the appropriate minister. Surely, all of them, including the Prime Minister, knew how badly out of control this arrive scam was going. They had the opportunity to rein in this out-of-control spending and stop the criminality, but they did not. That is what Canadians should be most appalled about, not necessarily just our professional public servants and those individuals they contracted with, such as GC Strategies. They are under investigation. Quite frankly, the government and the Prime Minister need to be under investigation. We all know what is going to happen; we knew about it in the Aga Khan scandal and the SNC-Lavalin scandal. There is a two-tiered level of justice when it comes to dealing with government misconduct, potential government criminality and potential criminality involving the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister has the luxury of hiding behind cabinet confidentiality. Today, in the ethics committee, I put it this way to the RCMP commissioner: Are Canadians to believe that the Prime Minister can engage in a whole host of criminal activities and simply hide behind the shield of cabinet confidentiality? He did not have a good response, I will admit. Certainly, that is what it looks like. As a former Crown prosecutor, I can say that there was ample evidence to support the charge of obstruction of justice by the Prime Minister in his campaign of trying to influence the actions of the first indigenous attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould. However, again, the government would not release the documents. It would not release them to the Ethics Commissioner and certainly not to the RCMP. However, the government talks about how independent the RCMP is. It talks about how it is going to be transparent and accountable. The Prime Minister promised Canadians that in 2015. Madam Speaker, look at the mess they have created in the last eight years. They are the most corrupt government this country has ever seen. There is no question about that. The member for Winnipeg North can laugh all he wants; he knows it is the truth. He knows how difficult it is, day after day, to sit in this House and defend the illegal actions of the government. I have so much to say here that I do not even know where to begin. Now the members of the NDP caucus are blindly following along with everything the Liberal government has to say. They are so hypocritical. They will challenge and they will fiercely try to argue that we should be holding the government to account, yet they blindly support it time after time. They voted with the Liberal government on at least eight occasions to continue funding this particular scam. If they had voted no on at least one occasion if not all of those occasions, I certainly would not be standing here today talking about the scandal and its cost to the taxpayers. I will conclude with this. After eight years, the Liberal government has proven itself both financially incompetent and riddled with corruption. Common-sense Conservatives will get to the bottom of the scandal and bring home accountability for taxpayers. Therefore I stand in the House today, along with my Conservative colleagues, to hold the government accountable for its reckless and irresponsible use of taxpayer dollars. Conservatives demand that the government take decisive action to recover all funds paid to the ArriveCAN contractors, and most importantly the subcontractors, who failed to deliver on their obligations. We are asking for that within 100 days of the motion's being adopted. We are calling on the Prime Minister to present a comprehensive report to the House demonstrating the successful repayment of the taxpayer funds. This motion is a crucial step in bringing home accountability for Canadians, and it is well within the federal government's mandate. With a commitment to common-sense governance, Conservatives are steadfast in unravelling the scandal and restoring accountability for taxpayers. I encourage all members of the House to stand and support our common-sense motion.

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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux (Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons, Lib.)

Feb/27/24 4:21:54 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the word that comes to mind is “wow”. That is quite the extreme statement coming from the member. So much for facts. I hope he does not believe 90% of the things he said. The question that comes to mind is this. I wonder whether he would hold the very same standard to his own leader, who was responsible for the issuing of millions of dollars in contracts to Coredal Systems Consulting Inc., the very same people who are with GC Strategies. Would he apply the same principles to the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada that he is applying to others? Maybe he should skip the character assassinations and focus on the issue. If he is not going to answer that question, maybe he could offer an idea from Conservatives as to how we can improve the procurement process.

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Mr. Larry Brock

Feb/27/24 4:23:02 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I stand 100% on every word that I said in my speech. I will defend that inside and outside the House, and I will continue to use the same talking points. That is how I respond to my friend's question.

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Mrs. Julie Vignola (Beauport—Limoilou, BQ)

Feb/27/24 4:23:31 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I have the pleasure of working with my colleague at the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates and since October 2022 we have been studying the issue of ArriveCAN, with its tens of thousands of pages to read. It is fascinating. A notice of motion was introduced about Coredal Systems Consulting, which had the same owners as GC Strategies. I wonder how many other businesses we should be looking into. Does my colleague think that the system that was exposed through ArriveCAN might be even bigger and more widespread than we might think?

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Mr. Larry Brock

Feb/27/24 4:24:23 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I too enjoy working with my friend on a number of committees. I always value her sage advice, her thoughtful questions and the probing way she too wants to get to the bottom of this. I think she touched upon a very important point. We are basically speaking in the House about GC Strategies and what it did to the procurement process within the arrive scam context. However, with respect to the broader point and to respond to my colleague, I think it is symbolic of what has been allowed to occur with the corrupt Liberal government. If it occurred with arrive scam, one only has to wonder how many other millions, if not billions, of wasted dollars have gone to other similar contractors and subcontractors, so I think there is an excellent opportunity to expand this in many other ways onto many other committees.

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Ms. Rachel Blaney (North Island—Powell River, NDP)

Feb/27/24 4:25:38 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we do know that when the Conservatives were in power, they gave over $7 million to GC Strategies under its former name. We know that $4 million of those contracts was awarded when the Leader of the Opposition was the parliamentary secretary, and of course we know that the Phoenix scandal, which the Auditor General has compared to ArriveCAN, has the same sort of scandal behind it. Phoenix, of course, was done under the Conservatives' government. I have a question for the member, though. I appreciate the discussion today and have no problem going after GC Strategies, but I am interested to hear whether the member thinks we should also be looking at McKinsey & Company, Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, Accenture, KPMG and Ernst and Young, which are also getting millions and millions of taxpayer dollars. I am just wondering.

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Mr. Larry Brock

Feb/27/24 4:26:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, if there was impropriety in the awarding of those contracts, or any suspicions of criminality, yes, we should be looking at that.

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Ms. Julie Dzerowicz (Davenport, Lib.)

Feb/27/24 4:26:58 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is always an honour to speak on behalf of the residents of my riding of Davenport. It will be my pleasure to share my time with the hon. member for Mississauga—Lakeshore. I have some prepared remarks, but first I want to provide a bit of context for those who might be listening. I want to go into a few details about the motion that is before us today. In terms of context, we are going to be talking about the ArriveCAN app. For members of the public who might have forgotten, the ArriveCAN app was a key tool in protecting Canadians during the pandemic as we went travelling. As we have come out of the pandemic, sometimes I think we have forgotten how intense a time it was and how historic a time it was. Literally, the world shut down on March 15, 2020. Professor Adam Tooze, Columbia University, wrote a book called Shutdown. He said that the first half of 2020 was historic; 95% of the world's economies suffered a simultaneous contraction. He said that had never happened before. Three billion adults were furloughed from their jobs or tried to work from home, and that had also never happened before. The sum of lost earnings just in the first months of the pandemic was $10 trillion U.S., more than a tenth of the global GDP. The global economy was shut down, and the Canadian government was trying to grapple with what COVID-19 was, how we were going to keep Canadians safe, how we were going to ensure that people would be able to pay their bills, how we could protect Canadians, and how we could help our small and large businesses, our societies and our cities. That is what we were consumed with at the time. People will recall that we were moving quickly and making lots of decisions, because we had to move quickly. The regular processes we had in place were not followed all of the time. A lot of the decisions around the ArriveCAN app happened during this time. It is important for us to remember that context. The motion before us is an opposition day motion. Basically, it is asking for a lot of documentation around the ArriveCAN app to be tabled here in the House of Commons, in terms of the decision-making. There is also a portion about recouping all of the funds that were paid to develop the ArriveCAN app. I will not be supporting the motion. The reason for that is that there are already a number of independent investigations under way right now, and we have to allow time for those investigations to be completed. They are being done by outstanding, independent organizations. Also, we have already heard from the Auditor General, and there are already a number of steps being taken. I believe there are some recommendations from the procurement ombud. I will go through a couple of those items right now. CBSA has committed to implementing every recommendation set out by the Auditor General's report, as well as by the similar report by the procurement ombud. In addition to all of these independent reports, CBSA is also conducting an internal audit to assess the procurement practices. Where specific allegations of misconduct have been made, CBSA has launched an investigation that is still in process and has referred all allegations to the RCMP. A lot of work is under way. The Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates is also looking into it. It is right for all of these investigations to be under way, particularly when there are concerns about anything that we are doing from a procurement perspective. I am now going to move into my prepared remarks on government procurement. The federal government is committed to ensuring that the procurement of goods and services is done in a fair, open and transparent manner, and, crucially, in accordance with policies, regulations, guidelines, trade agreements and procedures. Legislation, including the Financial Administration Act, along with Treasury Board policies, establishes clear requirements for the administration of government, including for contracting activities. The Financial Administration Act sets out the requirements needed when the government is making public disbursements, which include contracts. For example, section 32 requires that funds be available before entering into a contract. Section 33 deals with ensuring that payments are lawful charges against the appropriation and that the appropriation is not exceeded. The Treasury Board Secretariat, through the office of the comptroller general, provides government-wide direction to support the implementation of mandatory Treasury Board policies related to financial management and the management of assets and acquired services. The Treasury Board sets the administrative policies for federal procurement, guided by the principles of fairness, openness, transparency, competition, and integrity, all while ensuring best value. For example, its directive on the management of procurement lays out the expectations and requirements that departments and agencies must follow so their procurements are managed in a way that supports the delivery of programs and services to Canadians. It is also managed in a way that will demonstrate the best value and in a way that is consistent with the Government of Canada's socio-economic and environmental objectives. This framework supports the management of procurement so it is fair, open and transparent. There are also clearly defined responsibilities for government departments when conducting procurements, including those for services. First and foremost, government departments and agencies are expected to maintain the integrity of the procurement process and protect government spending from fraud and unethical business practices. This is done through internal processes and controls and through dedicated procurement professionals and effective mechanisms for the disclosure of any wrongdoing. Second, government departments and agencies are responsible for clearly defining the intended outcomes of a procurement, including operational requirements, expected benefits and how those outcomes align with the government's strategic direction and total costs over the life cycle. The Government of Canada has clear rules and controls in place to ensure contracting is done in an ethical manner and upholds the values and ethics of the public service. In the public service, like elsewhere in society, when governing rules are broken, there are consequences and corrective measures are taken. Just as getting best value is built into the contracting procedures, so is accountability for the spending of public money. For instance, all proposals are required to be reviewed through a conflict of interest lens and evaluators are required to recuse themselves for real or possible conflicts. There is also the code of conduct for procurement, which sets out clear expectations for vendors and their subcontractors in the areas of human rights, labour standards, conflict of interest and environmental responsibility. That means the government is committed to upholding and promoting the high standards and values Canadians expect, and the same is expected from vendors and their subcontractors. I would also remind the House that the government's integrity regime serves to hold suppliers accountable for misconduct. The integrity regime helps foster ethical business practices, ensures due process and upholds the public trust. Public trust is gained through transparency. That is why government contracts over $10,000 are publicly disclosed on the open government portal, so Canadians are better able to hold the government and public sector officials accountable. The name of the company, the value of the contract and a description of the work are all publicly available. In conclusion, I want to assure everyone in the House, and indeed across Canada, that the government takes all concerns regarding contracting and consultants seriously. The Government of Canada has a strong framework of rules to direct how procurements need to be conducted, and it is constantly looking at strengthening and clarifying those rules. It also offers guidance and training to employees to ensure they know, understand and obey these rules. I talked about trust earlier, and that is certainly the foundation of any public institution. It is crucial for Canadians to trust their public institutions. It is also vital for them to trust the employees who support those institutions. Furthermore, it is essential they trust that any procurement conducted on their behalf is done ethically, fairly, openly and transparently. Upholding that trust is vital to any public institution in this country. The federal government is committed to ensuring taxpayer dollars are spent responsibly in a way that provides value for Canadians, and it will continue to advance the priorities of Canadians.

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Ms. Lindsay Mathyssen (London—Fanshawe, NDP)

Feb/27/24 4:36:48 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague said very clearly that she would not be supporting this motion because other investigations are ongoing, but one of the key points of this motion calls on the government to collect and recoup all funds paid to ArriveCAN contractors and subcontractors. When we are talking about having trust in the government, which she spoke of at the end of her speech, and trust in the institutions, the trust of managing finances is certainly a huge part of that. Why does she not believe it is incumbent upon the House to ask for the recoupment of that money so trust can be ensured?

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Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

Feb/27/24 4:37:41 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there may be a point in the future when it would be appropriate to re-collect some of those funds back from contractors. However, what I would say right now is that there are a number of investigations under way: the investigations through the RCMP and the investigations through the other independent bodies through the House. They might, in the end, make some conclusions to say there are some monies that are owed back to the Government of Canada, but I would like those investigations to be concluded before we ask for any funds to be returned.

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Mr. Marty Morantz (Charleswood—St. James—Assiniboia—Headingley, CPC)

Feb/27/24 4:38:30 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, one time in the not-too-distant past, we put forward a motion in the House to have the Auditor General study the ArriveCAN fiasco. With respect, the member voted against having the Auditor General do that work. I wonder if the member now regrets taking that position and, if she had it back, whether she would vote for the Auditor General to do that study.

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Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

Feb/27/24 4:39:00 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I recall that, during the pandemic, there was a series of votes that came to the House about audits for small businesses and the various things we were spending on while the pandemic was under way. I recall that there were a number of times that I did not vote for those audits to take place, and the reason was that we were still heavily into the pandemic and we needed to make sure that we were focusing our resources on ensuring that we were supporting Canadians, from a health care perspective and from an economic perspective. There are limited resources within our bureaucracy, so we had to focus our resources. It was never meant that there should ever not be proper oversight or proper spending of our public resources.

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Mr. René Villemure (Trois-Rivières, BQ)

Feb/27/24 4:39:57 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, we have been talking about procurement and ArriveCAN. There were plenty of disasters before ArriveCAN. When we look at the government's real capacity to manage passports, borders, when we look at WE Charity or employment insurance, Canada Life, we realize one thing: the government is incapable of carrying out its fundamental duty, which is to provide services to the public. I have seen my colleague and his colleagues show some contrition many times. They say they are sorry, that this will never happen again, that the investigations are under way. In reality, these incidents occur on a regular basis. Earlier my colleague talked about ethics. I would like to know what she thinks, ethically speaking, about these endless scandals.

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Ms. Julie Dzerowicz

Feb/27/24 4:40:58 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, misconduct of any kind in our procurement processes is never acceptable. For about 10 minutes, I gave a speech about all the things we have in place that will protect processes. They do everything they can to inform our bureaucracy and our government officials, who act on behalf of our government, to ensure that they have processes in place such that we are doing our best to spend our public money ethically. When things go wrong, we have a number of mechanisms that allow us to look at what went wrong and how we can do better the next time around. I started my whole speech by giving some context. We went through a huge pandemic that had huge economic consequences on our lives and in the world today. Surely there were going to be some mistakes made, and it is right for us to be looking at that right now. We will make some corrections and do better as we move forward.

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The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès)

Feb/27/24 4:42:08 p.m.
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Order. It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, Public Services and Procurement; the hon. member for Kitchener Centre, Foreign Affairs; and the hon. member for South Okanagan—West Kootenay, Agriculture and Agri-Food.

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Mr. Charles Sousa (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Services and Procurement, Lib.)

Feb/27/24 4:42:36 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, our government takes its responsibility for the stewardship of public funds very seriously, and we are committed to ensuring that government spending stands up to the highest levels of scrutiny. Contracting for goods and services is a routine part of business in any government. It enables us to deliver the services and programs that Canadians need and expect, and we have important guardrails in place to maintain the integrity of the process. Government procurement is carried out in accordance with a number of regulations, trade agreements, policies, procedures and guidelines. This is the governing framework when it comes to federal procurement that public servants are expected to follow. Even in a time of crisis, such as what we faced during the global pandemic, basic rules must be followed to ensure that we are getting value for money while meeting the needs of Canadians, as urgent as those needs may be. Clearly, that did not happen in the case of ArriveCAN. The revelations brought forth by the Auditor General and the procurement ombudsman are deeply troubling, to say the least. I think we can all agree with that. We know that there are other investigations under way, which we fully support, so we can get to the bottom of this issue. I can assure the House that any wrongdoing will be addressed. In the meantime, we owe it to Canadians to immediately act upon the recommendations of the Auditor General and the procurement ombudsman, and that is precisely what our government is doing. Public Services and Procurement Canada, or PSPC, as it is commonly known, plays an important role in these matters. When it comes to deciding whether to contract out certain projects, the government takes many factors into consideration. It starts with the proposition that contractors are there to support the good work of our world-class public servants. Where it is determined that there is need for professional services, PSPC then works as the federal government's central purchasing agent with departments to procure those services in an open, fair and transparent fashion. PSPC procures on behalf of other departments and agencies when requirements are beyond their own contracting authority and advises on the steps needed to ensure that money is well spent. With regard to ArriveCAN, we know that it was put in place urgently to track and trace travellers as they crossed the border and limit the spread of COVID-19 within Canada. Public servants acted with extreme urgency on a number of fronts during the early days of the pandemic to keep Canadians safe, and the ArriveCAN app was a critical tool at that time. I want to be clear that the issues with ArriveCAN should not reflect on the public service's overall response to the pandemic. It should be proud of its work to procure vital supplies, as well as the vaccines, that ultimately helped lift Canada out of crisis. However, unlike those other urgent procurements at the time, it is clear now that the way procurement was done in support of the creation and maintenance of the ArriveCAN app was unacceptable. Indeed, there are many questions surrounding the management and integrity of the government's procurement processes for IT services associated with ArriveCAN. For its part, PSPC is already taking action to ensure that lessons learned are turned into concrete action. That means going beyond addressing the specific issues related to any one specific contractor, as important as it is to hold them to account, and fixing the broader issues that have allowed this mismanagement to happen in the first place. In November, PSPC temporarily suspended all delegated authorities, including the authorities of the Canada Border Services Agency, to authorize professional services based on task authorizations. The department also provided direction to its procurement officers to ensure that all task authorizations include a focus on clear tasks and deliverables. We are glad to see that the Auditor General agreed with the actions we have taken. All federal departments must now formally agree to a new set of terms and conditions to obtain access to select professional service methods of supply. PSPC is also updating its guidance to aid departments in procuring effectively and responsibly when using PSPC's procurement instruments under their own authorities. Of course, adhering to procurement policies, directives and guidelines is a shared responsibility across government departments and agencies. In the case of ArriveCAN, it is quite clear that a handful of public servants failed on that front. Our government is committed to fixing the system so that cannot happen again. Let me be clear, when it comes to holding suppliers accountable, PSPC is looking at ways to improve its integrity regime, including with regards to fraud, which will help us take swift action against bad actors for their misconduct. I will note that, on an ongoing basis and as part of the regular business, PSPC proactively seeks to uncover improper conduct and investigates potential wrongdoings in its contracts. Should an investigation reveal wrongdoing, PSPC informs law enforcement for possible criminal investigation. The department also seeks to recover funds when wrongdoing is found. However, members opposite want to push lies. They say that “Well, we're focused on finding the truth and making sure that those responsible are held accountable—

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