International Trade Committee on March 21st, 2024

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Ms. Sider.

[Candace Sider]

I would concur with what Ms. Campbell is saying. It would not impact the border.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Great.

I would say—and I'm sure most witnesses here would agree—that we need to move toward the modernized approach of this system, understanding that there are some issues right now that need to be addressed before implementation.

I'd also like to ask more about the blackout period. I recall that the blackout period is between seven and 14 days. What will that mean to you?

Will you still be able to set up new businesses that could likely import for the first time, or would you not be able to do that during those blackout periods when the new system is up?

[Kim Campbell]

We are still officially waiting, although I guess you might have heard on Tuesday when the actual blackout period starts. We now know it is April 26, but I can tell you right now that there has been no official communication from the CBSA to the trade chain partner community. That is still disappointing. We have certainly asked them to do that. We did that even a couple of weeks ago. We still haven't seen it.

As for the blackout period, I want to go on the record that that was another one we were surprised to hear about. The CBSA team said that the TCPs have requested this very extended, long blackout period, which is absolutely not true. In fact, it's the complete opposite. We've been advocating for over a year to try to make it as short as possible. We are completely perplexed. We've all put in large systems, not only with the government, but in our own businesses, and we have never had a three-week blackout period in which we can do nothing.

To finally answer your question, the other problem is that with the CARM client portal—if I can hardly say it after 10 years, I'm sure it's hard for a lot of other people to write—nobody will be able to access it. To your point, no, they won't be able to register.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Jalbert, would you like to share some of your thoughts on this?

[Renate Jalbert]

I agree with the comments that have been made. Having a blackout period really prevents the registration, the accounting and the payment of duties and taxes. It really causes a lot of havoc, even in billing customers.

One of the issues you can see is that customers expect the duties and tax bills during a certain period of time. They may have year-end accounting at that point in time. The billing will not occur for duties and taxes because the entries won't be filed with Customs.

It's a very long period to have absolutely no activity and no ability to register.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Bilodeau.

[Tammy Bilodeau]

The other concern that's been raised is that when the system does come online on May 13, the CBSA is not quite sure yet how they are going to manage the influx of volume that's been sitting for those 13 to 16 days. That's a known issue that they've raised. It is supposed to be communicated as a part of the transition plan, but we've been told, as industry partners, that we may not be able to transmit on May 13. They're going to tell us when they can transmit because they want to ensure that they don't flood their system on day one.

That's a further concern, and again, we're awaiting final confirmation. You can imagine that, with an organization that imports hundreds of thousands of entries per month, it's very scary for me to figure out what's going to happen on May 13 or subsequently.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

We have been talking about May 13 many times. Without pausing the system, what other recommendation that was not mentioned in your remarks would you like to share with the committee?

Anyone who wants to can start.

[Tammy Bilodeau]

I'm sorry. Do you mean pausing the system for the transition period or pausing the implementation overall?

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

I mean pausing the implementation overall.

[Tammy Bilodeau]

I think the recommendations that we've made are really reflective of the fact that there are several known issues that haven't been corrected from a systemic perspective. We've talked about the opt-in program for portal registration, which we think needs to be a permanent solution and not just a transitionary measure so that small and medium-sized businesses are not disproportionately impacted by this.

I'm not sure that there are really any other alternatives at this point, other than to ensure that we have a transition plan that we understand and can accommodate, that there's appropriate contingency planning in place, and that we make this system more flexible to ensure that our Canadian economy can continue to thrive from imports into Canada.

[Wilson Miao, Liberal, Richmond Centre, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

It's five o'clock. It's my understanding that bells will start to ring at 5:15. We have the motion by Mr. Savard-Tremblay to deal with.

Does the committee want to do two more rounds, a Conservative and a Liberal, or do you want to end the meeting now and go on to dealing with Mr. Savard-Tremblay?

I can see Mr. Cannings indicating that he wants to deal with Mr. Savard-Tremblay.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

We would love to do one more round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

It's the will of the committee here.

Mr. Savard-Tremblay.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

I believe it will be fairly short.

I think the reaction from my Conservative colleagues is quite positive. They will tell us. I also spoke with my Liberal colleague, who proposed two amendments that I think could be considered. I'll let her propose them. I think we'll be able to proceed fairly quickly.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Let's give Mr. Jeneroux and Mr. Sidhu a turn, and then we will end this and go into the balance of our meeting.

Okay, you have five minutes.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I want to go back to you, Ms. Upton, from the beginning of the testimony. I want to talk about the subcontractors again. You said that 20% are subcontractors within this project.

We know from the ArriveCAN scandal—I will take the liberty of calling it that—that the procurement ombud said that 76% of the subcontractors did no actual work. I'm again throwing it back to you. Will you produce a list of all the subcontractors that have been subcontracted, work or no work, as part of this project?

[Louise Upton]

I think it's important to note, though, that for the subcontractors that we would have engaged, we are responsible for their work. They have deliverables assigned. They have work and requirements that they need to meet, including getting security clearance from the Government of Canada, as well as very specific deliverables that they need to meet in terms of the project.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

Your testimony would be that the 20% of the subcontractors did the work. There's nobody out there that you've subcontracted to that, unlike for the ArriveCAN app, did zero work.

[Louise Upton]

The subcontractors on our project were engaged to do work on our project and have delivered work on our project.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

So, 100% of the 20% have done work.

[Louise Upton]

The subcontractors on our project have delivered work. They have deliverables assigned on the project.

[Matt Jeneroux, Conservative, Edmonton Riverbend, AB]

You'll provide a list of those subcontractors to the committee.