Government Operations Committee on Feb. 8th, 2023

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

I'm wondering, then, how you—as President of the Treasury Board and a representative of this government—can feel comfortable giving over $100 million to an organization that was implicated in such a terrible lack of ethics and scandal, to the tune of an over fiftyfold increase since the time your government has been in place.

Can you explain how you and your government can align with such a company, one that lacks such ethics, on such a grand scale—50 times greater than that of the previous government?

[Mona Fortier]

Actually, I'd like to inform you that, under the previous government, an integrity regime was put in place. We have continued to use this integrity regime, which makes sure that we foster ethical business practices. At this time, as you know, McKinsey is not deemed an ineligible supplier under the integrity regime.

As you probably heard from Minister Jaczek on Monday, PSPC administers this regime, and they are best placed to comment on the integrity regime.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

You're passing the buck. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you.

Mr. Kusmierczyk, it's over to you for six minutes, please.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you so much, Madam President, for being here again at the OGGO committee and for providing your testimony and your insights on this important issue.

Can you give us details about the contracts awarded to McKinsey & Company?

[Mona Fortier]

Thank you for the question, dear colleague.

Since 2015, McKinsey was awarded 34 contracts worth a total of $116.8 million. Two factors account for nearly the entire amount. I believe that it's important to be aware of the fact that McKinsey was awarded three competitive contracts worth a combined $55.8 million. It was also awarded a contract under a national master standing offer, for benchmarking analysis services worth $48.8 million.

In other words, if procurement services had not awarded the national master standing offer for benchmarking, the total would have been only half of that amount.

That's it, then, for the contracts awarded to McKinsey.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you very much.

Has the government enhanced contract transparency?

[Mona Fortier]

As I mentioned earlier, at the request of the Prime Minister, the minister, Ms. Helena Jaczek, and I have been conducting a review. We acknowledge that there are concerns about how the government discloses work that has been contracted out. We will therefore continue to focus on the contract data. In terms of proactive disclosure, the act currently requires five information fields. Right now, there are 36, and we are testing five more to ensure that Canadians are aware of the extent to which contracts are disclosed proactively.

We are going to continue to make sure that proactive disclosure is put into practice. I am of course relying on your participation, as part of your analysis, to continue to improve the existing system.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Thank you for that response.

The examination of McKinsey & Company contracts will be carried out by internal auditors.

Can they really report problems?

[Mona Fortier]

I'm sorry, but could you repeat your question?

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Yes.

The examination of McKinsey & Company contracts will be carried out by internal auditors.

Can they really report problems?

[Mona Fortier]

I'm having a bit of trouble hearing today. Thank you for repeating the question.

As I mentioned in my opening address, we have internal audit teams, and they could do the work. They are independent and objective in their appraisals and their work. They also do the work in compliance with international audit standards. As I mentioned already, the procurement ombudsman could also make recommendations. The ombudsman is neutral and independent. I will therefore welcome his recommendations.

As we know, the Auditor General will carry out this examination if she wishes, of course. We will take her recommendations and analysis into consideration.

[Irek Kusmierczyk, Liberal, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

What kind of expertise does outsourcing let the government access, in your opinion, that it might not have in-house or that it might be lacking?

Where do you see outsourcing playing a strategic or critical role in making sure that we are providing vital services to Canadians and delivering services to Canadians, and making sure that we're supporting our public servants in their roles in delivering a quality public service?

[Mona Fortier]

Thank you for that question.

As you know, we have a very ambitious agenda. Our government has a very hard-working public service. Sometimes, we need to complement that work to make sure that we deliver the programs and services we're bringing forward. That complement of work of Canada's professional public service sometimes meets the unexpected fluctuations in workload.

It's also to acquire special expertise. I know that Catherine Luelo has a lot to say when I meet with her to talk about our digital ambition. The talent that we're looking for, we have inside our public service. We also need expertise from the private sector. I'm sure that during the next hour, she'll be able to share how IT is one area that we're lacking in and where we have a shortage of workers to help us move forward with our digital government.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for reminding me that six minutes is over already.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you.

We'll go to Ms. Vignola, for six minutes please.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the President of the Treasury Board and the other witnesses for being with us today.

The Treasury Board is the employer of the federal public service.

How much of a priority should the public service place on strengthening internal capacity through training, as was suggested by Mr. Dominic Barton last week, to pull the the machinery of government out of Stone Age?

Those were Mr. Barton's words, but it's not at all what I think.

[Mona Fortier]

I think we agree on the fact that we have a very robust public service, in which there is a lot of talent as well as the required expertise. However, in view of the work we have to do, we sometimes need to address our short-term needs by going out and getting expertise we don't have.

For example, we may need an architect to draw up plans for a building, in which case we could go and get one. Complementary professional services are very important.

We also have a long-term strategy for skills within the public service. There are many ways to provide training, and we sometimes make use of outside professional services.

There is also the Canada School of Public service, which provides training to ensure that our public servants have the right talent, expertise and skills.

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

Thank you very much.

The public service should indeed be a springboard for talent. We shouldn't have any trouble recruiting people. The public service should be so appealing that it has to turn applicants down. I know that we are currently in a crisis, but you get the idea. Canadians should see us as the very best government organization there is. We should really be a very appealing place to work.

Two contracts were awarded to McKinsey & Company to improve the productivity of public servants who process pay and take care of Phoenix system errors. That's what we learned this week.

I don't think the problem lies with public service employees, but with the system itself.

Wouldn't it have been much more cost effective to do something like hire programmer analysts from IBM, which created the Phoenix system, rather than blaming public servants for a lack of productivity and hiring a consultancy firm to try to make them more productive?

I'll give you an example of what I mean.

It's as if I had a running team that included Bruny Surin and Andre De Grasse, and instead of giving them running shoes and having them run on a rubberized track, I were to take their shoes away and say, "Let's go. Run as fast as you can."

To some extent, that's what we do with our public servants. We've given them a system that doesn't work and then asked them why they're not doing better.

Why hire consultants rather than experienced programmer analysts, as IBM had suggested at the outset?

[Mona Fortier]

I'm also a fan of Bruny Surin and Andre De Grasse. I think that we're on the same wavelength. We want a public service that can properly respond to the requirements of various projects, including the one we administer for Phoenix.

People in the public service do very good work. I'd like to point out that Public Services and Procurement Canada, PSPC, awarded a contract to McKinsey & Company, for accelerator and other services, to rationalize processes and standardize work at the Public Service Pay Centre. These were therefore complementary services.

This considerably sped up and increased overall productivity and accuracy at the pay centre. It was an improvement and it helped public servants to do their work effectively.

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

However, would we have needed it if the system had worked properly?

[Mona Fortier]

We all agree that the system did not work…

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

Here we go again.

[Mona Fortier]

… and were making every possible effort to get it working. Public servants have to be paid and it's one of the priorities of my mandate.

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

In short, you're satisfied with the services provided by McKinsey.

Is that right?

[Mona Fortier]

I can tell you that PSPC was satisfied with the outcome, which was to integrate accelerator services to rationalize the processes and standardize work at the pay centre. There was a 14% productivity increase over the same period in 2021. My understanding is that the work was useful, and it will enable us to pursue our mandate in connection with the Phoenix system.