SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 301

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
April 17, 2024 02:00PM
Context: House Hansard - 301 - Apr/17/24
Mr. Larry Brock
  • Apr/17/24 4:40:45 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, Mr. Firth's actions were not accidental but intentional. This was not a mistake. He knew his resources would not qualify for taxpayer monies without manipulating their experience. Does Mr. Firth think that the Prime Minister or the Liberal cabinet ministers should be at the bar answering questions today, instead of him, or is he willing to go to jail for them?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:41:09 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, can I speak to my counsel, please?
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The Speaker
  • Apr/17/24 4:41:14 p.m.
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Go ahead, Mr. Firth.
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:41:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am not even sure what the question is there.
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The Speaker
  • Apr/17/24 4:41:29 p.m.
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I wish to inform the hon. member that his time has elapsed. Some hon. members: Oh, oh! The Speaker: I would like to inform the hon. member for Brantford—Brant, and we will be able to show him this on the record, that actually by the time he finished his question the time he had had already elapsed.
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Mr. Larry Brock
  • Apr/17/24 4:42:31 p.m.
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I respect that, Mr. Speaker, but he clearly indicated that he did not understand the question. In terms of fairness to Mr. Firth, he should be afforded an opportunity for me to rephrase the question so he can understand it and respond accordingly.
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Mr. Kevin Lamoureux
  • Apr/17/24 4:42:31 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, you started off today talking about the importance of decorum. I do not think it is appropriate for the member opposite to be challenging the Speaker when the rules, as you expressed them, were very clear. The time has expired. That means we move on to the next person, and he should not be challenging the Chair.
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The Speaker
  • Apr/17/24 4:42:51 p.m.
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I appreciate the intervention from the parliamentary secretary to the government House leader. I am going to take a moment to consult on this matter. The Chair is going to permit the hon. member for Brantford—Brant to please put a question within 10 seconds so that the witness, Mr. Firth, can answer the question.
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Mr. Larry Brock
  • Apr/17/24 4:43:58 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, does Mr. Firth think that he should be solely responsible for this scam, or should the Prime Minister, the Liberal cabinet ministers and certain members of the Liberal back bench be at this bar facing legal consequences?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:44:20 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am sorry. I do not want to be elusive. I cannot comment on this; it is kind of speculative. I am not sure what I can do here.
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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné (Terrebonne, BQ)
  • Apr/17/24 4:44:38 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, far be it from me to defend Canada's Parliament, an institution to which I hope one day Quebec will no longer have to answer. Nevertheless, I must defend the principles behind this Parliament, in particular respect for democratic institutions, and therefore of the parliamentary democracy in which Quebec participates. A few weeks ago, the Office of the Auditor General submitted a report on the management of the ArriveCAN app. To quote the Auditor General, management of the app was the worst she had seen in her career. The ArriveCAN app was supposed to cost $80,000 and ended up costing $60 million. In the same report, we learned that one company composed of two people, the owner of which is here today, pocketed more than $19 million. That company is GC Strategies. We also learned that the ArriveCAN affair is only the tip of the iceberg. The comptroller general recently revealed that GC Strategies, and its ancestor Coredal Systems Consulting, have obtained contracts totalling $108 million since 2011. Manual searches could reveal other contracts, so it might be even more than $108 million. We learned in the Auditor General's report and from several witnesses that the witness here today, Mr. Kristian Firth, and public servants participated in whisky tastings, dinners, golf tournaments and dozens of other events. It is normal and healthy in a self-respecting democracy that the parliamentarians responsible for ensuring the proper functioning of the government take a closer look at what may have happened to prevent it from happening again. That is the reason why the owners of GC Strategies were invited to testify several times in committee. Mr. Kristian Firth refused to answer several questions. He compromised parliamentarians' work by not submitting the requested documents on time. He lied to the committee. In particular, he refused to submit the list of public servants with whom he did business, a list he has just now submitted but that is incomplete based on the testimony we heard in committee. It is clear that, if that is where we are, there are huge problems with the government's procurement processes. For almost 15 years now, it has been so difficult for companies to pass the preselection stage to do business with the government that small companies that provide no services at all are being paid a commission so that the government can enter into a contract with the company that will actually be doing the work. It is completely absurd. Here we have a person who took advantage of our broken system and pushed it to the extreme. I will give members an example. When the Canada Border Services Agency identified KPMG as a company with which it could do business and as a company already on the list of pre-approved companies, it contacted KPMG. The contract would be pre-established. That is when a public servant at the CBSA called KPMG to tell them that there would be an intermediary in their contract. The intermediary was GC Strategies. We learned that Mr. Kristian Firth met with KPMG with respect to the contract. That is precisely the problem. Mr. Kristian Firth and his two-person company did not even provide the head-hunting service they claimed to provide. They did absolutely nothing and pocketed $84,000. My question for Mr. Firth is as follows: Does he think that taxpayers got their money's worth for the $84,000 in this affair?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:48:21 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the reality is that this is common practice for people with existing contracts. They get subcontractors to come through their company, because typically the time to procure directly, even if one is one of the 635 vendors who could do work with the government, takes too long. Again, I was not aware of the file and what the urgency was and the deliverables, but I did know timelines were very tight. My assumption, and again this is being speculative, was that they were leveraging the contract I had, because it needed to be done quickly.
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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné
  • Apr/17/24 4:49:01 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, what we heard in committee is that the public servants did everything they could to make sure the contracts were awarded quickly. That is why many contracts were awarded non-competitively. Once again, we are hearing contradictory testimony. According to Mr. Firth, why did the public servant agree to simply pick up the phone and call KPMG to tell them that there would be an intermediary and that that intermediary would be paid $84,000 to do absolutely nothing? Why does he think the public servant did that?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:49:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, again, not being elusive, I cannot comment on why somebody picked up the phone in a government organization and made a call.
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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné
  • Apr/17/24 4:49:46 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, does Mr. Firth have a number in mind for the many gifts in money and in kind that he offered the federal public servants?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:49:59 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, that number is zero.
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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné
  • Apr/17/24 4:50:06 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, to summarize, Mr. Firth never paid for a coffee, never paid for a restaurant meal, never paid for a golf tournament and never paid for a whisky tasting, despite all the testimony we heard?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:50:22 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I have admitted I would go out and I would invite government employees to lunches or to coffee, understanding that if they were to show up, they had already gone through their regular chain of command and already asked permission to accept that.
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Ms. Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné
  • Apr/17/24 4:50:43 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, here is a good example of a contradiction. We went from zero to yes, there were coffees, restaurant meals, golf tournaments, whisky tastings and on and on, with dozens of federal public servants. I will repeat the same question. How much, in money or in kind, was given to the federal public servants?
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Mr. Kristian Firth
  • Apr/17/24 4:51:04 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the first question was specific to what was given to receive contracts by government employees. That is why I said it was zero. Once the contracts had been awarded through regular procurement practices, they became a client, and we would have frequent meetings to check on the health of the project, whether that was over lunch or whether that was during coffee.
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