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.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
In a 2016-17 report by the interim procurement ombudsman, he cited the fact there is a shortage of procurement capacity. He highlighted it as one of the major concerns. Has he shared that concern with you?
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
Perhaps the procurement capacity was not associated with the office itself, but rather with the broader community. It's one of the struggles that the procurement world lives with, in that in terms of the level of procurement expertise within the departments that are actually doing the procuring themselves, that's where there is a lack of capacity, not within the procurement office itself.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Okay. You're set in having the resources needed to be able to do your job?
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
Yes. We're currently looking to gain additional procurement expertise, but that is coming.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Your fourth priority was around knowledge building and knowledge sharing. You also touched on that as it comes to disputes. You want to make sure that the resources within the department have that knowledge. What are your thoughts, plans, or visions on that specific fourth priority?
Procurement Ombudsman, Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
On a yearly basis, as part of the annual report to Parliament, we identify the issues that have come up most frequently, based on the touchpoints we have. For the most recent fiscal year, we had 411 touchpoints. Those are instances where people have reached out to the procurement ombudsman's office. We categorize those by issue. Once we have identified those issues, we see the prevailing themes.
From the knowledge development and sharing perspective, our goals are to find those root issues that are repetitive issues that the procurement ombudsman's office continues to see. As I explained, sometimes when we're reviewing complaints we're limited by the facts of the complaint, and therefore are not able to broaden the research available on those points, but only to address the issue at hand.
What knowledge development and sharing will do is allow a deeper understanding. In the coming months, we hope to develop what those three to five research papers will look like in terms of topics for research. Then, of those three to five, we'll see which ones have the additional depth and information available to be able to do a deeper dive. We anticipate, in year one, to do one or two deep dives on these issues that are recurring themes that we see as an office.
To promote the 10-year anniversary, we also hope to publish a 10-year review as to what we've seen as an office over that 10-year period. We think that actually creates a “lessons learned” type of document that will be useful both to the supply community and to government buyers alike.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Yasmin Ratansi
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Jeglic, and congratulations on your appointment.
Thank you, committee members, for asking good questions.
The meeting is adjourned.