It's “Every one who, by deceit, falsehood or other fraudulent means...defrauds the public...”—in this case the taxpayer—“of any property, money,”—in this case, taxpayer funds—“or valuable security, or any service” if it's over $5,000, proceeding by indictment and imprisonment for 14 years.
Favouring one particular company and allowing it to egregiously break the procurement rules in non-compliance with numerous statutes, numerous regulations and numerous policies.... In fact, PSPC published a document called “Doing Business with the Government of Canada”, in which it highlighted openness, transparency and accountability.
In all of those circumstances, do you not see a low threshold case of making out that the Government of Canada, through the PSPC and other departments, is defrauding a taxpayer by favouring McKinsey over other legitimate vendors? Could an argument not be made, sir?