Evidence of meeting #90 for Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was allegations.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Minister, we have been in contact with whistle-blowers. You said you want to follow the evidence, and a whistle-blower has told us that after submitting the 300-page dossier to your department, they volunteered additional documentation—documentation and evidence that was refused by your department.
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
If you are in possession of any evidence, Mr. Cooper, as a lawyer, I would ask you to turn it over to us. Then we will look at the evidence. If you don't want to do that, you can give it to the third party law firm or the Auditor General.
Conservative
Michael Cooper Conservative St. Albert—Edmonton, AB
Minister, they offered it to your department. It was refused. It's no wonder they say that you and your department are more interested in damage control than in getting the answers the taxpayers deserve.
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
That's not it at all, Mr. Cooper. I have said to everyone publicly that I will take any and all action based on evidence. You're a lawyer. You went to law school. I act on evidence, not allegation. If I have evidence of wrongdoing or of any formal material breach under the contribution agreement, we will take all actions needed and we will get to the bottom of this together.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you, Minister.
Ms. Khalid, you have exactly five minutes. Go ahead, please.
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
I appreciate all the fancy buzzwords that my Conservative colleagues are using and all the talk on whistle-blowers.
Mr. Champagne, can you perhaps go through the timelines and the facts of exactly what has happened with this fact-finding exercise and STDC? When did the initial third party fact-finding exercise start, and what was the goal and scope of this exercise? Let's talk about facts and not buzzwords.
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
Thank you very much, Ms. Khalid. I welcome that, and I welcome the work of this committee.
Listen, I'm the one who demanded that the department work with the Auditor General. We welcomed her work. We worked with her for weeks. We all want the same thing. We want to get to the bottom of this. If there is evidence of wrongdoing, let's take all the action needed under the law. That's clear.
In terms of dates, I think you're right. We need to get back to facts, because there are a lot of allegations from other people, and members of the opposition are meeting with whistle-blowers.
I am pleased you're doing that, but there are legal consequences for you, if you do that. If you have evidence, you must turn it over so we can take action on it.
I work on the basis of due process. March 5 is the day I was briefed by the department. I'm sure, through access to information, you can get access to that brief. I insisted, on the basis of allegations at the time, that we do a fact-finding mission. We hired Raymond Chabot on March 17. They did their investigation until September. On September 27—you will be happy, because that's also going to be a matter of public record—I was briefed on the results of the fact-finding exercise and the proposed next steps. On October 3, I demanded that we have a management response and action plan, because the allegations we saw in the report, or what was presented to us, needed a number of corrective actions with respect to how certain projects are selected and approved in terms of eligibility, funding and monitoring.
In addition to that, you'll be happy that I demanded, at the time, that the department conduct a full audit, understanding that the Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton report was an overview. When there were allegations with respect to human resources, we demanded.... To go back to Mr. Cooper's very thoughtful question, I do not have the right as minister to involve myself in the human resources of an independent organization, under the law. We demanded the board grant us full access to the records and the people. We demanded they waive any restrictive covenants, so people could speak freely to us. If anyone in this group has any contact with a new whistle-blower or third party who has complained, they can go to a law firm. We did a selection process. They're about to be appointed in the coming days, and people can speak freely to them. They will provide a report to the minister. Then, on the basis of that and the Auditor General's report, we'll take all the appropriate steps.
In the meantime, I suspended all funding. As you know, I'm a prudent person when managing public funds. I said, “Do you know what? Until everything is clear, and until we get to the bottom of the issue on funding and HR—as colleagues have raised—I'm suspending all funding.” To preserve the integrity of the process and defend taxpayers, I said we would stop all funding. Once we've cleared away the mud, we will get back to business, but there might be additional actions needed. As you've seen in the press, I can tell you that people were concerned I might even overstep. I'll make sure we respect the law, due process and agreements, so that whatever we do will be fully compliant with the laws, regulations, and terms and conditions.
Liberal
Iqra Khalid Liberal Mississauga—Erin Mills, ON
Thank you, Minister.
You said you took action and stopped all funding as soon as you learned about it, so the investigation can happen. You created a proactive regime to ensure that what you're doing as minister is the right thing to do for Canadians.
Can you tell me why that matters to you?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
I fundamentally believe that any institution or organization that receives public funding needs to be held to the highest standard of governance and respect for human resources practices. We've heard it. At the time, in 2001—it was not me or you—Parliament decided to create an arm's-length organization. That was the choice—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Brassard
Thank you, Minister.
Mr. Villemure, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.
Bloc
René Villemure Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
Minister, my understanding of what you said earlier is that you're prepared to provide a report that would refer to “Mr. A”, “Mr. B” and “Mr. C”, for example, or “company A”, “company B” and “company C”.
Bloc
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
The deputy minister, who is the hardest-working person I know, said yes, so it should work.
Bloc
René Villemure Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
Thank you very much.
Would you please give me your impression of the allegations that were made at the time?
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
They were very serious allegations, which I took very seriously. As you know, they had circulated. I believe the individuals in question had spoken to various organizations.
By the time I was made aware of them, between March 5 and 17, we had already engaged a firm of experts to conduct an investigation. I still think it's not up to the minister to conduct that kind of inquiry. There are experts who can do that. You yourself are an ethics expert. I have powers under the act and the contribution agreement, but I nevertheless have to leave it up to independent third parties to conduct their investigation and provide me with evidence. Then I can take measures based on that evidence, as I have done thus far.
Bloc
René Villemure Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
Would you please expand on those allegations?
As I told you earlier, I couldn't understand from the report what had happened.
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
There were definitely allegations regarding general governance. That's why Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton referred in its report to inconsistencies and opportunities for improvement.
As for the existence of conflicts of interest, several examples of which I believe Mr. Cooper raised, the issue was in compliance with all the clauses of the contribution agreement, notably with regard to project selection and approval. I want to inform the committee that, under the terms of the contribution agreement, the board of directors is responsible for approving all projects. So I think certain questions should be put to the members of the management team regarding—
Bloc
René Villemure Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
I apologize for interrupting, but I have very little time.
The document states that individuals finding themselves in conflict of interest must recuse themselves. That's a practice that we hear about virtually everywhere. However, as you know, even if a person leaves the room, the influence that person exercises doesn't.
What do you think about that?
Conservative
Liberal
François-Philippe Champagne Liberal Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC
I'll definitely answer in less than that.
I think we have to adopt the best practices there are. People in government, for example, practise proactive disclosure. You know that as an ethicist. There are ways to establish firewalls. All the work that's being done on the subject, such as what the committee is doing today, is very important.
I asked SDTC to take corrective measures and told it that funding would not resume until all corrective measures were about to be taken and I was about to be satisfied.
Conservative