Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the Auditor General for appearing on this very important topic.
I must say that there is a lot of anger and a lot of frustration around the findings of your report, and I think rightly so when we look at $50 million to $60 million. I represent a region in northwest British Columbia of mostly rural and remote communities that have a huge number of needs that could be taken care of with $50 million to $60 million.
I think of the City of Prince Rupert, which desperately needs to replace its water pipes and needs tens of millions of dollars of investment in core infrastructure. I think of Smithers, Fort St. James and Port Clements: All of them need waste-water treatment facilities that cost millions of dollars. Takla needs a new school.
These are all things that could be funded with the money the government has wasted on this app. It's frustrating and angering that either gross incompetence or negligence—or certainly what looks like misconduct—has led to so much public money being wasted.
I'll start on that note. The questions we have really have to do with procurement more broadly and the use of subcontractors to do the work the public service should be able to do.
I'll start with paragraph 1.39 of your report. You noted that GC Strategies was awarded a contract for ArriveCAN without any documentation and without having submitted a proposal. Your report says, “There was no evidence that the agency considered a proposal or any similar document from GC Strategies for this non-competitive contract.”
I'm curious as to what documentation your investigation was privy to in this regard. Was it only emails, or were you able to examine phone records, text messages, etc., on both personal and government devices? Also, do you suspect that the discussions for GC Strategies to be awarded the contract took place on channels that you didn't have access to?