Evidence of meeting #106 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was businesses.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
I'm not sure I understand—
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
You made a comment that the social benefit requirements will make it easier for indigenous businesses to obtain contracts. It was in your preamble.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Yes, I know. It's in there, and I'm trying to think of the context in which that was said.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
I understand what you're getting at, but again, it goes back to what we've heard from all witnesses, and from the procurement ombudsman, that it's very difficult. The red tape is very burdensome. I'm just wondering. With another layer of red tape, how will it make it easier for indigenous businesses?
Director General, Economic and Business Opportunities, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
One way of looking at it is that PSAB is one tool in the tool kit for promoting and supporting indigenous-owned businesses. Certainly there is some administration in getting into that, but we're also working in a number of areas outside of PSAB to generally support indigenous-owned businesses to get into the marketplace and make them bid ready. That's the whole objective of our support.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
You mentioned shipbuilding, which is great. I've been out to Irving, and I was out to Seaspan just a short while ago in Esquimalt to see the work there. It's great that they're engaging.
Is there anything that we are doing as part of PSAB to encourage first nation participation in the trades and apprenticeships? If you go to Irving and Seaspan, there's a demand for high-skilled trade work. It's great that we have requirements and engagement, but are we doing that first step to get indigenous people into the trades and into the apprenticeships so that they can better qualify or better bid for these businesses?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Certainly in the shipbuilding work, we did work with the companies. There is a working group, and it includes indigenous groups as well, to figure out and get ahead of where those longer-term job opportunities are going to be. We've had ESDC engaged as well so that we can line up skills training and development to feed into those opportunities.
Conservative
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Thanks very much.
I want to ask about something that Mr. McCauley already raised, which is the division of INAC into two new government departments. I appreciate the answer that it may not affect first nations procurement, but I am curious to know in which of those new departments PSAB would reside.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
That decision hasn't been made yet. The mandate letter made it clear that Minister Philpott would have indigenous services and that Minister Bennett would have more of the nation-to-nation, longer-term arrangement.
At this point in time, it looks like it might be in the indigenous services side, but until all of the decisions are made, until OICs are done, and legislation is done, it hasn't been grounded in a final decision. For now we're running as INAC, as indigenous services, and as CIRNA collectively. We're working through this and not allowing our programs to get caught up in the conversations that are happening in and around what those two departments will look like down the road.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
That's quite an interesting point from a government operations perspective. Certainly, it's a question of whether we are viewing first nations procurement as part of meeting a treaty obligation or we are viewing it as part of the suite of economic development services the Government of Canada might offer.
Do you have any views on which department would be most appropriate for PSAB?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
I think in the end, it's about the strategy of providing services to businesses and having federal departments coordinate around the opportunity. It could go in either department in some ways, depending on how you look at it. In the end, it's a strategy. It's a program. It works with partner departments, and either minister could take responsibility for that, so we'll have to wait to see how they make the division.
Given that it's more administrative in nature, it might fall more easily on the services side than on the broader relationship, nationhood side.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Okay. What I'm hearing is that it probably makes more sense to put it in indigenous services, but that final decision has not yet been made.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
That's correct.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Okay. Thanks very much. I really appreciate that.
In terms of first nations businesses bidding on and sometimes receiving federal contracts outside of the set-aside, we've heard that the number of those contracts has doubled. I'm wondering if the dollar value has also doubled.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
I'm happy to give you some PSPC statistics. It's interesting when we talk about those indigenous suppliers within PSAB versus non-PSAB, because we collect statistics but we don't go back, and they've self-identified as being indigenous.
I'll give you an example here. In 2014-15, at PSPC, under PSAB, we had contracts worth about $178 million. Outside of it, we had contracts worth about $25 million to $26 million.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
That's $26 million outside of PSAB but going to aboriginal businesses.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
Exactly. They're just competing in the general streams of procurements.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
How does that $26 million compare with the previous year, or 10 years ago? Can you give us some frame of reference as to whether it's increasing?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
In the previous year, in the same kinds of streams, under PSAB, it was about $50 million, and for indigenous suppliers who self-identified, it was $11 million.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Okay. Would you consider that to be a trend or something unusual in one of those years?
Assistant Deputy Minister, Procurement, Department of Public Works and Government Services
I'm looking at the statistics from all the fiscal years, and we are seeing a steady increase. It goes back to the fact that they've self-identified, but we're not going back outside of PSAB to review the status. We're hoping to work on that as part of the statistical work that will be coming forward.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Lands and Economic Development, Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development
Can I add one answer?
Another challenge we have with the data we have in the system is that businesses may not always register themselves with the same name, so the move to business numbers is going to help us to track the activity of indigenous businesses better. They may change their name or go into a joint venture, so our current database may not be capturing everyone, just from a nomenclature point of view. Hopefully, the use of business numbers is going to allow us to regularize the statistics a bit better.
NDP
Erin Weir NDP Regina—Lewvan, SK
Okay, excellent.
There was something in your testimony, Ms. Reza, that I maybe didn't completely understand, which was the distinction between procurement for first nations businesses as part of modern treaties versus the overall PSAB program. Could you perhaps just speak to how they do or don't fit together?
