Evidence of meeting #135 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was chair.
A recording is available from Parliament.
An hon. member
Yes. I'm on the English channel, and French is coming through.
Conservative
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
The head of mission can decide. It seems foolish then to buy a $9-million condo because it has a kitchen that can accommodate these functions, when the office you acquired in 2018.... Apparently, you forgot to include a kitchen, but he still might have a commercial kitchen prepare the food, and host any number of events at restaurants.
Could you table for the committee, please, Mr. Cousineau, the number of functions that Mr. Clark has expensed at restaurants since his time as CG? Can you table that for the committee?
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and International Platform, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Mr. Chair, I can certainly look at the information that's available in that context and table it.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Okay. That's great.
How many official functions has Ambassador Rae hosted at his residence?
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and International Platform, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Mr. Chair, I'm going to turn to Mark Allen, who's responsible for the operation—
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Mr. Allen, give me just the number, please. How many events?
Director General, North America, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I'm afraid I don't have the number for Mr. Rae.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Can you table it with the committee, please?
Director General, North America, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
We certainly will.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
It's pretty remarkable.
Mr. Allen, I want to ask you a quick question. Is it your contention that had those meetings that occurred at the official residence of Mr. Clark happened at the office of the consul general, and not in his residence, Canada would not have succeeded in those trade negotiations or in those acquisitions? Is that what your statement is?
Director General, North America, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
I can't speak about those specific events. I think the intimacy and the personal nature of an official residence for a head of a Canadian mission adds to their general tool kit.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
If that were the case, wouldn't it make sense then in 2018 to have acquired a joint space that achieved that for both our UN representative and for the CG instead of buying separate facilities for that purpose?
Director General, North America, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Again, I think having multiple options for different types of events is very important.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
When you're playing with other people's money, I guess you can have as many options as you need.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
That is our time. We're going to go to Mr. Kusmierczyk, and then we will take a short suspension.
Mr. Kusmierczyk from sunny Windsor, go ahead, sir.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Cousineau, I'm going to ask you a series of questions. I just want to have quick responses so I can get through them.
All procedures for procurement were followed, so this was done by the book. Is that correct?
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and International Platform, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Mr. Chair, we absolutely followed all the policies from Treasury Board and all the internal guidelines from GAC, so all the processes were followed.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Thank you. You did an 88-page analysis of the decision on this property. Is that correct?
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and International Platform, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
Mr. Chair, I can't speak about the number of pages of that analysis, but there was an analysis.
Liberal
Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, People and International Platform, Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development
It was an analysis. I can't qualify the analysis, but definitely there was an analysis that actually met all the criteria and the process.
Liberal
Irek Kusmierczyk Liberal Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
That's perfect.
You visited 21 properties, and the value of those properties ranged from $8 million to $21 million. Is that correct, roughly speaking? You looked at 21 properties.