Government Operations Committee on June 5th, 2024

[Julie Vignola, Bloc, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Am I mistaken when I say that if I gave you the opportunity to choose between managing and supervising teams and solving problems and finding strategies to meet needs, you would choose the second option instead?

Managing teams does not seem to be something that turns you on; am I mistaken about that? There is nothing wrong with it. We all have our own personalities.

[Minh Doan]

One leads to the other. At my level, you have to like managing people, mentoring, guiding the next generation of chief information officers or directors general.

However, in doing that, I may also touch on what I like: finding strategies and solutions. Of course, getting higher up in the organization chart, I am no longer the one doing the coding or directly awarding contracts; that is handled by the employees who report to me.

Nonetheless, I found a way to do those things. I like managing teams, I like talking to people about my own mistakes so they can learn from them, I like advancing their careers. I find that truly enriching, but I can do it at the same time as I meet the needs associated with my position.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you, Mr. Doan.

Mr. Bachrach, go ahead, please.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Doan, have you read the Auditor General's report?

[Minh Doan]

Yes, I have.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Do you agree with her findings, when it comes to the ArriveCAN procurement?

[Minh Doan]

I agree with all of her findings as well as those of the OPO.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Chair, I wonder if I could use a couple of my minutes to dig into this question of how we're going to get these emails that seem to be a matter of some interest.

I understand there was a request for the IT ticket related to Mr. Doan's request for his emails to be restored, but that's separate from a request for the emails themselves.

I wonder if we might get some advice from the clerk or from someone on how we can go about that, if we could simply request the backup file of all the emails and if that's going to be prohibitively difficult, given the translation requirements.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Are you looking for only emails regarding ArriveCAN or for every email, which I assume is going to be a fair amount, and for what period?

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I think the emails pertinent to this study are the ones that we're after. I'm just not sure whether it's more efficient to get the entire email file or what the process could be.

Now that we know that the emails exist and that they're relevant to the study, it seems as if we should go through the step of asking for them, formally.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I think we may have asked. We can look into it, and we can certainly take it up. There seems to be general will from the committee to seek those. We can finalize, for sure, what we've asked for and what is awaiting translation, and then bring it up first thing at our Monday meeting and ask for a production order for that.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

At our Monday meeting, is that your preference?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

I'm not sure we're going to find out right now exactly what we've asked for because we've asked for so many things on this particular issue.

Mr. Barrett, if you recall, I'm happy to have you just interject.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Chair, the existence of the data is the subject of investigation. Of course, we fully support getting the emails, but it might expedite the process if we just ask if a backup exists. If the answer is yes, then we could send for the files. It would be tough to filter because we don't know the date range and the like. This is a specific backup file. We just don't have the specifics of it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Why don't we leave it with the clerk and myself, and we'll follow up with CBSA about what Mr. Barrett's commenting on. We'll double-check on what we've already asked for.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I can make a motion along those lines. It could be very simple, that the committee reach out to CBSA and Shared Services Canada and ask whether an intact backup of Mr. Doan's emails exists.

It is so moved.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Are we fine with that, colleagues?

[An hon. member]

Agreed.

[Parm Bains, Liberal, Steveston—Richmond East, BC]

If I can add, Mr. Doan indicated that it was one file that included all of these emails, so maybe add that piece to it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Sure. That's a good point.

Do you want to add to that, or can we move on?

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I think we're getting into semantics around in what condition the files exist or in what format they exist.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

We'll leave it with the clerk to reach out to Shared Services and CBSA, and hopefully we'll have an answer Monday, and then we can move forward from there. That's perfect.

Mr. Genuis, go ahead, please.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

My colleague Mr. Brock and others have spoken about a series of text messages between Mr. Doan and Mr. MacDonald. These are two central figures in this issue, and Mr. Doan seems to be disputing the potential veracity of these text messages.

I wonder, Mr. Doan, if you would be willing to share with the committee all of your text messages with Mr. MacDonald. I think that would be quite revealing and would help us to probably identify other key facts of what has gone on. Would you be able to provide that to the committee?

[Minh Doan]

I'll go through my phones and work with Shared Services and with Treasury Board to see what I can recover. Yes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

That was a bit of an imprecise answer. Will you provide the text messages? Are the text messages available, or have they been corrupted through file transfer and DIYs on your phone as well?