Evidence of meeting #34 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was citt.
A recording is available from Parliament.
June 10th, 2008 / 9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Welcome, Mr. Powell. We're glad to have you here, actually. It is very important that all departments of government have a sense of accountability and transparency. So if there is a situation where there is either some ambiguity or a lack of clarity, I think we all have a responsibility to ascertain the direction of the government.
I have just a couple of questions.
On this particular issue, we had, of course, the deputy minister and a number of his staff at this committee previously. Have you had a chance to review the testimony they gave?
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
I'm a bit concerned in one particular way, because in this testimony—and I might refer it to the attention of the committee and whoever would be interested—the question was asked, how was the minister involved in the contracting generally? It was a very broad-based question.
There was a response by the deputy minister, Mr. Marshall, in which he stated that “the minister is the general director of the department; he does not get involved in any individual contracting. He is typically informed only at the very end, when the department has made a recommendation.”
There was another question asked: “Was the minister or any of his staff involved in the TPG contract?” It was a very direct question, and the answer was unequivocal from the deputy minister: “Not in any way.”
He was asked whether he was satisfied that the contracting issue was a fair and open process. I think it's very important, and I'm going to read through the response here, because I think it gets right to the crux of where we're heading on this.
He said, “Yes, I am. ... We received three bids for this contract. The technical part was evaluated by five separate, individual evaluators, who did not talk to each other during the process.”
The secondary portion was the financial part. It was “evaluated by a lead evaluator and checked by a second one. I was briefed after the process had progressed to a certain extent. I was not told who won the contract, but I asked my chief risk officer, since it was potentially a large one”—as you've mentioned, this was a large contract—“to assure me after a review that all the proper processes had been followed; he did so. The minister's office was informed in due course on March 14, much later, when it was getting ready to be sent over to Treasury Board.” In other words, it was a fait accompli, just subject to the last-minute checks.
The deputy minister at that point said, though, “I personally interviewed the evaluators, and they've assured me there was absolutely no interference from anybody, let alone the minister's office, so the evaluations were never changed.” Obviously the minister was not one of the evaluators.
Did any of the evaluators complain either to Minister Fortier and/or to the deputy minister? Mr. Marshall said, “Absolutely not, and I asked them that question point-blank.”
So that brings me obviously to a situation where we have what I guess you would call a direct conflict of opinion on this matter. That, of course, will come to the assessment and judgment of this committee and others before. But I have just a couple of other thoughts.
How many contracts has TPG previously held with the federal government?
9:30 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
I don't know the number, but quite a few.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
Have you personally or have your staff met personally with the Minister of Public Works or any of his staff directly?
9:30 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
Minister Fortier?
9:30 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
No.
Just to clarify that, when we couldn't bid in 2006, this was a significant thing, not only for my company but for the department, because there were 200 highly skilled people working in there who would disappear if we couldn't bid. So I wrote to the minister saying, “Hey, look, you guys are supposed to be supporting small business and it's supposed to be a fair process here. I'd like to meet with you to discuss this.” And he refused to meet with me.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
The thing that disturbs me, of course, is that we have the CITT. It's an independent body there to adjudicate such disputes as this or whenever there's an inference that there might be a potential problem. You mentioned that they had their thoughts on the decision, and you've obviously differed with their opinion because we went on to a further complaint.
When the decision was reached by the tribunal the first time, what were the grounds for the dismissal?
9:35 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
It was this 10-day thing, you see.
9:35 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
Yes. They thought we should have complained, say, when Mr. Danek was hired eight months before, although it's really not a practical way to run a business, to—
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
But then in August you submitted a third complaint--
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
--on the same issue, on matters by the Federal Court. Was an inquiry conducted at that point?
9:35 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
No it wasn't, and the basis for that.... An individual in Public Works told me in confidence that there had been a second evaluation done and that the original scores were in fact very close. Now, this person was a contractor working in Public Works, so I was unwilling to name him, because of course he would have been out of a job immediately if I had. The tribunal said it couldn't take information from anonymous sources. If I had been able to give the guy some kind of whistle-blower protection, I could have done it. I was unwilling to sacrifice that person.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
My understanding is that we have that kind of capacity.
I noticed that again, after the decision from October 5, you filed a fourth complaint with the tribunal, which is your right to do. Then we even had a ruling. On December 20 the tribunal ruled that the complaint was not valid.
What were some of the reasons given? Can you tell us why they said the complaint was not valid at that time, after the fourth one?
9:35 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
Here's what happened on the fourth one.
The RFP process required PWGSC to check references. You had to have three project references, and the RFP process required that they be verified. We realized eventually that they hadn't done that. So that was a violation of the evaluation process. We filed that in September 2007, or around that timeframe, and then what happened—it was just mind-boggling, to tell you the truth—is that after we filed the complaint, Public Works said they would then check the references. So the contract was awarded October 31, and they were scurrying around like crazy trying to check these references on October 30, a year after the evaluation had been done. It was just an unbelievable thing.
The CITT said that was fine. That was the basis of their ruling. It doesn't make much sense to me, but that's what they said.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
Daryl Kramp Conservative Prince Edward—Hastings, ON
So there's obviously a difference of opinion between you, CITT, and the deputy ministers; they're all one-sided--
9:35 a.m.
President, The Powell Group - TPG Technology Consulting Ltd.
Can I come back to your comments about what Mr. Marshall said, because I read that testimony very carefully. Let me be clear. He said to the evaluation team, “Were you pressured to do anything?”, and they said no. I believe that's absolutely true. We won based on what the evaluation team did. Somewhere after the evaluation team was finished and before it went for contract award, the scores were changed. So of course the question Mr. Marshall asked wouldn't show up the problem. And I imagine he asked that on purpose, but I'm guessing.
