Oh, oh!
Evidence of meeting #125 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 terms.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #125 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 terms.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:25 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
12:25 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
I look at the role of your office, and I see that it's a many-faceted role. You review complaints on the one hand, and on the other hand you have to review the processes for fairness, etc. The complaints are obviously driven by a complainant. That triggers the process. How do you decide which processes to review for fairness and all of that on the non-complaints side of your mandate?
12:25 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
From the procurement practice review standpoint, there's very much an environmental scan approach. It's a detailed metric. Again, I'll just couch this.... I'm in my second week, so I don't want to misstep in terms of how this is actually done. I will say that it's a robust system. They look at a very broad perspective as to whether there have there been audits of departments, what issues are coming up, how recently an audit was performed, whether there are any issues in the news, and what the top five issues are that we've been seeing as an office over one-, three-, and five-year periods.
You map all of that against the matrices of which departments are most often procuring goods. Obviously, to have the most impact, you want to hit those departments that are actually doing the bulk of the procurement. When you have that overlay, you see the matrix, and then, therefore, the reasonableness of those practice reviews is justified by the analytical data.
12:25 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
That's good to know.
Do you have jurisdiction over every federal department?
12:25 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
No, not every federal one—there are a hundred of them—and not CSIS and not the House of Commons and the Senate.
12:25 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Okay, but obviously you have broad jurisdiction.
The complaint on the awarding of a contract has a cash threshold, a dollar threshold.
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
That's correct.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
It seems low to me. I don't know if that's your assessment or if in your two weeks on the job you've had a chance to review that. Should the threshold be higher, do you think? Do you have any comments on that?
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
The threshold issue is something that comes up with regularity, but in terms of understanding the interplay between the ombudsman's office and that of the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, the CITT, I think it's very important that they complement one another. It's structured in such a way that you can't “forum-shop”. The thresholds put you under the thresholds covered by free trade agreements. Free trade agreements are covered by the CITT, which does a fantastic job at adjudicating those disputes. Therefore, the ombudsman's office is necessarily below those thresholds.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
There would be no overlap. Would there be a situation where someone could even choose one of the forums or not? They'd just have to make that choice, and then they couldn't use the other one.
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
To my knowledge, no.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Okay. You might be too early in your mandate to know that.
You can review the administration of a contract at any dollar value. What does “administration of the contract” mean for the average Canadian? What does that mean when you read it? Also, what powers does that actually give your office? It seems to me that it could be very broad.
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
Just to clarify your question, are you talking about the third prong?
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
I'm not sure which number of prong it is. It's that you can review any complaint with respect to the administration of a contract.
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
Exactly, but that doesn't allow you to look at the terms and conditions of the contract, so it's very limiting in that regard. Really, essentially, what we've found it to be is whether payment has been made or not. It's to compel payment on the part of the—
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
It is very narrow. That's right.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
It could possibly be broad....
You talked a bit about your independence. You're satisfied with the way the structure is in that it maintains your independence, but you also have to be neutral. What biases, perhaps, or subjective perspectives, do you bring to this role? Also, how do you try to dissociate yourself in that to remain neutral when you're perhaps dealing with competing parties?
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
That's a great question. I think the benefit I have is that I'm not a career bureaucrat coming from PSPC. I think that gives me an opportunity to see the world through a different lens.
12:30 p.m.
Voices
Oh, oh!
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
I meant no disparaging context by that.
From my experience, I believe that I have touched on various perspectives within the procurement process in terms of, one, being in an oversight capacity at PPP Canada, and two, as a doer, an adviser, a drafter, and an evaluator in understanding those issues differently. As an educator at Carleton University, I touched on the HR component. I'm seeing practically what skill sets are being developed versus what the needs are in the procurement world. I do think that there is a gap, so I very much take a practical approach when I teach the course to ensure that the skills of those undergraduate students that are developed actually map towards a career in procurement.
Finally, on the ADR side, at CIDRA, the Chicago International Dispute Resolution Association, I was involved in mediation and arbitration, which I think speaks to the last ADR prong of the mandate.
I really do think.... I'm sorry. I glossed over my Australian trade commission experience, which allowed me to take the role of the supplier and see it through their eyes, because I was assisting them with submissions and bid proposals for U.S. government opportunities at both the federal and the state level.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
You indicated earlier, when I had a chance to ask you a question, that both parties need to agree to go through an ADR process. Do you see that evolving at all as a way of compelling parties to agree? Or do you think the system works fine now?
12:30 p.m.
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
What I'd like to see, to be honest, is to move that process forward to get consent before the dispute arises. Most ADR practitioners would acknowledge the fact that when the dispute arises it's very difficult to gain consent, because then all of a sudden you have a dispute on your hands, so the parties aren't speaking to one another the same way they were at the outset of the contract. If there is a way to import that consent in terms of the contractual language, I think that would be my preference.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Perhaps consent in that just by bidding on a contract you're consenting to the process or something along those lines...?