Evidence of meeting #14 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was jamieson.
A video is available from Parliament.
2:55 p.m.
Liberal
Han Dong Liberal Don Valley North, ON
Thank you.
Ms. Fox, is it out of the ordinary for stakeholders to contact you unsolicited to seek a meeting or to pitch potential programs?
2:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
No, it's not out of the ordinary.
2:55 p.m.
Liberal
Han Dong Liberal Don Valley North, ON
Is it odd for a deputy minister who is no longer responsible for a file to be consulted by the new DM or officials?
2:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
No, it's not odd. I've worked with them in the past. I had extensive knowledge of the Canada Service Corps. As a public servant, I try to be helpful. If that means connecting people with the right people in government, then that's something I try to do.
2:55 p.m.
Liberal
2:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
I was appointed deputy minister of youth in 2017, both for youth and intergovernmental affairs. From 2017 to 2019, I had both portfolios. Following the election of 2019, I only kept the intergovernmental affairs portfolio.
2:55 p.m.
Liberal
Han Dong Liberal Don Valley North, ON
Is it safe to say that you had a long-standing relationship with youth stakeholders?
2:55 p.m.
Liberal
Han Dong Liberal Don Valley North, ON
It wouldn't be out of the ordinary for a public servant to have contact and a professional rapport with stakeholders that they deal with on a regular basis.
2:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
No. In fact, I think it is helpful to engage directly. As deputy minister of youth, not only did I engage with youth-serving organizations, but I engaged directly with youth to try to really inform the work that we did in government. That meant working with several organizations.
For instance, I worked with Right to Play and I went up to Attawapiskat to run basketball clinics for youth to be able to connect with them in a very different way than I would in an Ottawa boardroom. I took that to heart as deputy minister of youth.
3 p.m.
Liberal
Han Dong Liberal Don Valley North, ON
Thank you.
I will ask the same question I asked Ms. Kovacevic.
Who recommended that the government enter into a contribution agreement with WE Charity?
3 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
Nobody made that recommendation to me. I think ESDC was responsible for the program, and they would have made the recommendation to their minister. I was not involved in that.
3 p.m.
Liberal
3 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Sweet
Thank you very much, Mr. Dong.
Now we have these two very quick rounds coming up. That will be the end. We're at three o'clock right now, but we did start a little late.
Madame Gaudreau, you have two and half minutes.
3 p.m.
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My question is very simple and it's for the two of you.
Let's keep in mind that the commissioner will publish his report over the next few weeks. It is being said that the report will be published in the next year, but it will happen in the next few weeks. I also understood from all your comments how quickly things are moving. Sometimes a piece of information is available, and sometimes it is not. Through all this, the main issue, as we all know, is to avoid the appearance of conflict of interest.
A lot of time is currently being spent discussing this whole issue, but, at the end of the day, no grants have been awarded. I suspect that some things may have been done to prevent this situation. So this agreement with our young people could have come through.
I know that I am asking you a lot. However, based on your expertise, on what you have experienced on the inside and on what you are experiencing now that you have new information, can you tell us what your main recommendations would be for this type of a situation never to happen again? There will be other crises.
You each have 45 seconds to answer. I will let you choose who will answer first.
Ms. Fox, do you want to begin?
3 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of Indigenous Services
Yes, I can go first.
During our career, it is always important to take a bit of a step back, to look at best practices and to continue to learn. As public servants, we all have the responsibility to learn and to improve our work. Certain moments are conducive to that, and the pandemic is an excellent moment for it.
That said, I feel it is difficult to make recommendations in 45 seconds. What I can tell the committee today is that people are working hard, they are working well and they are dedicated, especially during a pandemic. I am proud of my entire team.
Once the pandemic is over, it will be important to take something of a step back to see what we can improve. However, it is very difficult for us to make recommendations at this time, while we are still managing the crisis.
3 p.m.
Bloc
Marie-Hélène Gaudreau Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
I think that kind of a report would be useful to parliamentarians and to committees, in case of another crisis.
Ms. Kovacevic, do you have any recommendations to make?
3 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Federal-Provincial Relations and Social Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Thank you.
I can only answer that question with respect to my roles and responsibilities in finance. The contribution agreement is the department of ESDC. The Department of Finance has nothing to do with that, and was only involved insofar as the funding agreement and the authority, obviously, that followed. I agree with my colleague, Deputy Fox, that there are always things to learn when you look back.
Having lived through the last eight months or so and delivering so many services so rapidly to Canadians in this unprecedented time, my sense is that speed is always an issue. There was a need to get things out the door quickly. Government and bureaucracies, I think, notoriously, are very dutiful and sometimes perceived to be quite slow.
We went through all the processes. We obeyed them all. We took no shortcuts, but we did them all very quickly. I think when you do things fast, sometimes you would be better off to maybe take a little more time to think about things. We didn't have that luxury when so many people were in need.
In the case of the CSSG—
3 p.m.
Bloc
3 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Sweet
I apologize. I did give extra time there, but we're way over.
Mr. Angus, go ahead.
3:05 p.m.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Thank you both for participating.
Thank you, Deputy Minister Fox, for going to Attawapiskat. I really appreciate that.
Ms. Kovacevic, thank you for being casual in emails. It's nice to see people who actually talk like human beings. I hope your superiors aren't upset that you were just as frank in your conversation. I think it's important.
The Liberals pitched to us that it always came up from the civil service, but the documents show us that this came from the top down. Bill Morneau gets an email from Craig Kielburger for $12 million and he gives his approval. It wasn't a mistake that it was on that list. It was overturned, finally, by Katie Telford. The PCO said they did not want this to go ahead, but Bill Morneau did want it to go ahead.
Just to wrap up here, because the Kielburgers were so tied to the Prime Minister, to Minister Chagger and to Minister Bill Morneau, I think the die was cast from the beginning.
They make lots of claims, those Kielburger boys. They are very slick. When they said that they could get 10,000 students, it must have sounded great, but I think due diligence would have asked the question, “Can they do this?” They claim they had Imagine Canada as a partner. Imagine Canada looked at this and said that it was not doable. They did not want to be part of it.
Even in June, Imagine Canada was still on the government documents as one of the partners, when they weren't. They said they could deliver for francophones. Only 7% of the people who signed up were francophone, and only 4% were from Quebec. That breached the Treasury Board guidelines.
I put it to you.... I am not blaming you. This was coming from Bill Morneau. This was coming from Minister Chagger's office, and everyone knew the Prime Minister was so tied to the Kielburgers that it put your department in an impossible situation. Decisions were made. If we had done due diligence, this scheme would never have gotten off the ground.
3:05 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Federal-Provincial Relations and Social Policy Branch, Department of Finance
Was that for me, sir?