QUESTION PERIOD — Public Services and Procurement
Procurement Process
February 7, 2024
My question for the government leader concerns the Procurement Ombud’s report into the ArriveCAN app. The ombud reviewed 41 contracts and found that 17 of them had not been proactively disclosed by the Trudeau government, which means that over 40% of the contracts he reviewed had been hidden.
If this secrecy sounds familiar, leader, it is for good reason. Over the past year, I have asked you many times about the Trudeau government’s outsourcing of the Canada Emergency Business Account small business loans program to the Accenture consulting firm for $208 million. None of those contracts were proactively disclosed. Leader, how many more contracts are being kept hidden from Canadian taxpayers?
Thank you for your question. With regard to the first part of your question, the report of the Procurement Ombud contained many recommendations. The government has accepted all of those recommendations and has implemented a management plan in response. Indeed, most recommendations have already been completed or will be completed soon.
With regard to your larger question about contracts, as you will know, having been in government and responsible for these matters, some contracts, depending upon the circumstances, do remain and must remain confidential for reasons of the protection of intellectual property and the like. It is a fact of life in the procurement process for this government and any other government in order for Canadians to be properly served by those who supply to them.
With respect to ArriveCAN, taxpayers’ money was wasted, transparency was an afterthought and procurement rules were broken. For example, the ombud found the criteria used for awarding a $25 million contract to GC Strategies in May 2022 favoured that two-person company. Leader, why did the Trudeau government rig the system in favour of GC Strategies?
Again, I do not accept the premise of your question. I do acknowledge, as we know, that there were real problems. That is why the government has suspended contracts with GC Strategies as well as with others who were found to not live up to the standards we expect in our procurement process. We look forward to the Auditor General’s report on this. As I said yesterday, I am sure that this will be a subject that will occupy us in the weeks to come.
