Evidence of meeting #45 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 digital.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
To the best of your knowledge, how often would you have briefed the minister on ArriveCAN?
As an Individual
I think it was really quite perfunctory, in terms of, “We have a solution to this problem”, and we launched it. If memory serves, we did a soft launch about a week before it was launched nationally.
It would have been very iterative. In those early days, we were meeting regularly and discussing many other issues around the border.
December 8th, 2022 / 4:10 p.m.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Would there have been a higher degree of information sharing between you or any of your direct reports and staff who worked for the minister, specifically with respect to ArriveCAN?
If the answer is yes, my next question will be whether any of those discussions would have involved contracts.
As an Individual
I wouldn't be aware of that.
Certainly, my IT folks and the staff in the travellers branch would have been working with our Public Health Agency colleagues on what the art of the possible was in putting something together.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Okay.
Do you have any familiarity with GC Strategies?
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
You're saying none. You don't have any in your role with CBSA or in your post-government employment.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Did CBSA work with PSPC to develop the contract for ArriveCAN?
As an Individual
I understand—and I think you've heard this testimony, because I've listened to it myself—that there were some contracts already in place, through which they did some initial task authorizations, and then they went through a more formal RFP process, or a selection process, later on.
I don't know the details of how that played itself out because, quite frankly, I didn't need to concern myself with that.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
When you talked about delivering something quickly for the minister—that “quick and dirty app”—was that developed in-house, or was that developed using external contractors?
As an Individual
I think we probably had some external contractors with us at the time, but I think those would be better questions to pose to the department.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
They'd be better questions that would.... I'm sorry.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Okay.
With what frequency were you communicating with PSPC on ArriveCAN?
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Who at CBSA would have been responsible for managing that project?
As an Individual
Again, the business requirements were established by the Public Health Agency, and any sort of contracting work that was done—because initially, we had....
I'll play it through a bit, if I may.
Conservative
As an Individual
In the initial phases, the Public Health Agency, as the business owner, was going to pay for it. They didn't have the resources available, so we made some in-kind contribution to the early development of it, and then they sought resources through the regular parliamentary process.
They paid for it, and then we were basically, as I mentioned, the general contractor for the app.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
So that I'm clear on it, in providing that support, it was in-house capacity at the Canada Border Services Agency that did that work for PHAC, which didn't have the capability. Is that correct?
Conservative