Evidence of meeting #51 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 bdc.
A video is available from Parliament.
6:25 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Okay. I'm sorry. I was trying to understand.
6:25 p.m.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I fundamentally don't have an issue with that, but my understanding is that we were coming to the committee business portion of our scheduling very soon. Can we delay the final decision until then? What I'm hearing is that there very much is alignment.
My only concern is that I really need to go back and get an understanding of what this does to the production of documents. We just received over 50,000 pages for McKinsey. With some of the dates and some of the volume that's going to be potentially generated, I just want to make sure we have enough time to go to translation and that we don't run into an issue.
6:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
I understand, and I think Mr. Johns has a brief answer for that.
6:25 p.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
That is part of the reason why I didn't include it in the McKinsey study. We're not going to be asking public servants to spend eight years on documents. That's my understanding of what it was going to take.
6:25 p.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
There are no documents, so hopefully that relieves your concern.
6:25 p.m.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
I want to make sure I understand.
It's been proposed that we conclude our study of McKinsey and begin our study of other companies. Is that right?
6:25 p.m.
A voice
Yes.
6:25 p.m.
Conservative
Garnett Genuis Conservative Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB
Thank you, Chair.
From what I understand, we didn't see the text of this in advance. We're inclined to be supportive in principle.
We have very limited time with the head of BDC, and I would like to have the additional round that we agreed to. On that basis, I would move to adjourn debate.
6:25 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
We have a motion to adjourn debate. May I have a show of hands?
(Motion agreed to)
I sense the will of the committee is that we take this up again when we have a bit more time. I'm going to guess, from my experience with the committee, that it will probably go ahead. It appears that we want to finish this off, but I think we could probably bring it back in on Monday, when I'm sure we will have it properly approved, if I were to guess.
Do you want to finish your round with Ms. Hudon, Mr. Johns? You have about two minutes.
6:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
The clerk has advised me that, when he moved his motion, he had two minutes left, so I'll let him finish the two minutes.
Please be brief, because we are cutting into the last portion now.
6:30 p.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
I'll be really quick, then.
On another instance of spending...and I'm going to go back to this issue because it's a real concern. There was a $320,000 employee outreach event, and the media reported that employees said they have no idea what the point of the pricey event was. I'm intrigued by two expenses in there that make up most of the costs: $145,000 spent on scriptwriting and video production, and another $146,000 was spent on audiovisual services.
That $146,000 was awarded without competition. The BDC is required to issue tender calls for contracts over $150,000. Curiously, the audiovisual spending was just $4,000 short of that limit.
My question to you is what the point was of that event. My second question is whether the two greatest expenses were intentionally billed at $4,000 and $5,000 short of the competition threshold. Was this done to avoid having to issue bids?
6:30 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Business Development Bank of Canada
On the purpose of the meeting, as it is part of BDC culture to bring all employees together, this time around, after 18 months of the pandemic and working from home—it was even more than 18 months; it was almost two years—we decided to organize an event where we would bring employees together physically across our offices across Canada and virtually with an interactive platform. The cost related to this event was to create that—
6:30 p.m.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
However, you didn't go to tender. You billed out just below the tender. It was really close.
Why was it so close? Did you try to avoid going externally and putting out a bid, or did you just select...?
6:30 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Business Development Bank of Canada
No, that would not be aligned with how we do things.
6:30 p.m.
NDP
February 8th, 2023 / 6:30 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Business Development Bank of Canada
I hear you, but it's not part of how we do things.
6:30 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
I'm afraid that is our time now.
Is it Mr. Paul-Hus for five, or is it Mr. Barrett?
It's Mr. Barrett for five minutes, please.
6:30 p.m.
Conservative
Michael Barrett Conservative Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON
Thanks, Chair.
Thank you for coming today.
I have a couple of questions about the value for money that Canadians get from the BDC as a Crown corporation.
First, for context, I'll ask if you know what the average price is for groceries for a family in Canada this year. Do you know what that's projected to be?