Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Ms. Hogan and team, for your tremendous work.
We're on the same side here. We want to make sure we improve accountability. This is about accountability and making sure that if there was wrongdoing, we hold to account the public servants who conducted that wrongdoing and those breaches of the controls and code of conduct. I thank you very much for your work.
The ArriveCAN app was built under extraordinary circumstances during the COVID-19 pandemic. The app was built in 30 days. It's a complex system that was downloaded 18 million times by folks across all platforms. It protected the privacy of persons using the app, including their very sensitive health information. The information that was gathered was shared securely across provincial health agencies within minutes, almost instantly. The app was also accessible. When we spoke with the CBSA officials who came before us, they said they didn't have the in-house capabilities to be able to pull this off in such a short period of time.
In your report, on page 16, you raised a concern. You stated that the Canada Border Services Agency had “consistent requests for resources with the highest levels of IT experience”.
Again, the report stated:
In our view, this meant that the agency likely paid for senior resources when work could have been done by resources with less experience that are paid less.
Can you explain to us how you would recommend we balance the need for cost-effectiveness versus needing high expertise to be able to pull off a complex piece of software in such a short period of time?