Government Operations Committee on March 26th, 2024

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

I'm sorry. I'm going to ask you to clarify.

Since the report was tabled, have you provided any further clarification on her report about the exact cost of ArriveCAN?

[Jonathan Moor]

No. We have not provided any further information, but the information that we've agreed to provide to the committee we're very happy to share with the Auditor General.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

It has been 50 days. Your work was shredded, frankly, by the Auditor General, who said the number has not been clarified.

We can't even get an exact number. You have not provided anything in 50 days to clear up any of the misperceptions or actually get a firm number.

[Jonathan Moor]

As I've said before, I don't think it's possible to get a completely firm number, because in the first year we did not have a separate accounting code. What we did was use our experts to make their best estimate of how much it had cost. Our best estimate remains $55 million.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Well, let me ask you this, because we are now aware that 76% of contractors who did work on this, who actually did no work, billed the CBSA. We know that there are records of shredded documents. That is well known and has been shared with Canadians.

Again, the Auditor General said there were “weak” financial controls and record-keeping when it came to your work.

As CFO, do you think a third party forensic audit of ArriveCAN is necessary based on what you now know and on the points I just raised?

[Jonathan Moor]

I think you raised a number of different points in there.

The procurement ombudsman referred to the 76%. That was actually the question previously about sort of who does the work. When you're using staff augmentation, we were checking the individuals having sufficient qualifications—

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

I'm going to ask this at sort of a high level.

With the facts that I've raised, the circumstances and what you know now as the CFO, do you believe that an independent third party forensic audit is necessary with ArriveCAN?

We have shredded documents, the Auditor General saying there were weak financial records and controls, and the procurement ombudsman's report. Yes or no, do you believe that a third party forensic audit is required here in these circumstances?

[Jonathan Moor]

I don't think it would add anything additional, because we've already had a third party audit in terms of the Auditor General and also the OPO. What we are acknowledging here is that we did not have a cost accounting code in year one, so there's a judgment: How much was being spent on ArriveCAN versus other operational activities?

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Sir, I think there would be many Canadians who would disagree and say that in this case a forensic audit by a third party is necessary for each of these, because the more we learn, the more vague and the more evasive, frankly, many of the witnesses will be on this.

I want to ask you about performance bonusing, Mr. Moor.

For the executives at the CBSA who have been responsible for what happened here with ArriveCAN, can you confirm whether they have received bonuses this year or not?

[Jonathan Moor]

I can't confirm if they received bonuses this year because the year is not actually at an end, but I can confirm that during the period under review I did receive performance payments. We've already agreed to come back with information on that to the committee.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Going forward, then, in that case, knowing now...with the Auditor General's report now tabled, do you believe executives at the CBSA responsible for ArriveCAN should get performance bonuses in the future?

[Jonathan Moor]

Well, I can't comment on that because lots of people are involved in lots of different things—

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

You wouldn't rule it out based on what you know and the findings here in the Auditor General's report, the procurement ombudsman's report and all the facts that you know, and based on how atrocious the financial record-keeping was at the CBSA. You can't rule it out and say now that executives at the CBSA who were responsible for this mess should not get a performance bonus going forward, now that you know what's in the Auditor General's report?

[Jonathan Moor]

Sir, I know what's in the Auditor General's report, and I'm disappointed. I come back to my previous comment.

When we do our financial assurance, we are on average at around 8% or 9% errors. Most of those are not compliance errors. They are administrative errors. In the Auditor General's case, she identified 18%. That is very disappointing, and I recognize that. However, a lot of that has to do with the fact that we did not have a cost accounting code at that time.

[Eric Duncan, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

There's an error of $60 million with ArriveCAN that Canadians are frustrated with and, again, you're disappointed. I'm going to ask you again. With being disappointed in the contents of the report and how damning it was about the financial practices and record-keeping, you're not going to rule out that executives at the CBSA this year are going to get performance bonuses based on what we now know with ArriveCAN.

[Jonathan Moor]

Well, I don't think that's a question I can answer, because I do not set performance bonuses.

What I can say is that we are taking action to address all the recommendations in the Auditor General's report. I do not agree that we don't have the information; there are areas in the information that we are uncertain about, and we had to make estimates.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you, Mr. Duncan and Mr. Moor.

Ms. Atwin, please go ahead.

[Jenica Atwin, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Moor, I'd like to thank you and your colleagues for being with us today. You'll have to forgive me, because I'm joining halfway through. Hopefully, I won't be repeating what my colleagues have already asked.

I read this is in your introductory notes: “PHAC asked the CBSA to assist them by developing a digital form, and the first version of ArriveCAN was released six weeks later.”

Can you walk us through what those first six weeks looked like?

[Jonathan Moor]

Those first six weeks were very, very difficult for the agency. The pandemic had been announced, and we were very much at the front line. We had individuals in the border services offices who were dealing with people who could have been infected by COVID-19. There were a number of repatriation flights.

The best we could do at that stage was to have a manual paper-based form. This was an issue for a lot of our officers, because we were being told at the same time that you could catch COVID from touching paper. It was an urgent matter to get this form digitized.

When you look at value for money, you see that the paper-based system was around three dollars per unit, whereas the ArriveCAN system is about one dollar per unit, or one dollar per traveller. It was more efficient than the paper-based system. It was actually also much more effective than the paper-based system. The paper-based system had to be sent off and it had to be coded into the records. It then had to be provided to PHAC, who then provided it to municipalities to actually follow up on the quarantine.

The Auditor General, in her own report, identifies that it was more effective to use ArriveCAN because they could get that information before the end of the 14-day period. With the paper-based system, it was taking up to three or four weeks to get that information. I think it is worth bearing in mind the effectiveness and the efficiency.

It was a very difficult time for all of us. As well, a large majority of our employees were sent home to work. That was a new thing for lots of us.

Therefore yes, I would say that at the start of the pandemic, it was a crisis situation. We were working incredibly long hours. During that time, I'm sure we made mistakes, and we should learn from those mistakes. It was a very stressful and difficult situation.

[Jenica Atwin, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Thank you very much. I certainly remember that time. We were told to wash even our groceries, for example, or wear gloves to pump gas. It was certainly a time of uncertainty.

Over the two and a half years after the fact, the CBSA responded to the challenging health requirements as they were coming at you. Again, it was kind of like drinking from a firehose. Through over 80 orders in council, 177 different versions of the app were released. I wouldn't ask you to explain each one, but what predominantly were some of those changes with each one of those iterations of the app?

[Jonathan Moor]

When we set up our governance structure in the pandemic, we set up two separate task areas. I was responsible for the internal task force. One of my colleagues was responsible for the border task force. All of ArriveCAN was done through the border task force. This was mentioned in the Auditor General's report in 2021. It was a partnership, at that stage, between PHAC, ourselves and a number of other government departments. Various decisions were being made minute by minute. I was not part of those decisions. I was running the internal task force, which was more focused on the activities of the organization and the health and safety of our officers.

It was a very dynamic environment. It was my understanding that things were changing very much at the last minute, and then that had to be coded to allow us to update ArriveCAN at the time. It was very complex, it was very difficult and very long hours were being worked.

[Jenica Atwin, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Thank you.

Are you aware of any traveller information and customs applications like ArriveCAN that were developed or procured by other governments?

[Jonathan Moor]

There were a number of them around the world. All of them were slightly different. Certainly the U.K.'s, which I was aware of, was different. I know the European one also. Basically, they were doing the same function. They were trying to record information on people travelling into the country so that they could trace those contacts—that was particularly important when you were seeing new variants coming in—and allow the public health agencies around the world to be able to track where those individuals had been and how the spread of the new variants was operating.

As well, as the ArriveCAN app progressed, we had the proof of vaccine credential. That was also a very complicated, difficult system, and it was complicated and difficult for us to be able to identify the vaccines and go right back into the provincial health data systems to check that they were valid.

[Jenica Atwin, Liberal, Fredericton, NB]

Were there any conversations happening—

I'm sorry. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

If you have a quick question, Ms. Atwin, you can go ahead.