Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Perhaps in over seven years, the reason why you've not seen me is that I've only been in this position for a small fraction of that time. I'm happy to make my inaugural appearance.
Thank you, Chair and esteemed colleagues, for the invitation to join today's discussion about IRCC's work with McKinsey & Company.
Folks, I think everybody in this room is familiar with some of the challenges Canadian businesses are facing as they seek to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. We could pore over the labour force survey statistics to figure out the extent of the labour shortage in Canada if we wanted to, but my view is that you can figure out the reality by walking down the main street of almost any community in Canada. You're going to find “help wanted” signs in the windows.
A lot of this is happening at a time when immigration already represents an extraordinary majority of our growth in the Canadian labour force. We need to continue to train our domestic workforce, there's no question, but it's not possible to meet the needs of the economy in the short or long term without embracing immigration as a key part of our strategy for growth. The fact of the matter is that we need more workers in just about every sector in every region of this country.
In November this past year, I announced that Canada is going to be increasing our annual immigration levels targets from 431,000 this past year to 465,000 this year and going to 500,000 by 2025.
These targets are supported by a plan that will capitalize on new tools to meet the needs of the Canadian economy while making it easier to settle newcomers in the communities with the greatest absorption capacity.
It's not unusual that a department might seek external advice on how to face certain challenges with its various departments or to achieve ambitious goals. However, to be clear, the advice we may have received over the course of a couple of contracts with McKinsey prior to my appointment to this position didn't touch on immigration policy, but rather efforts to digitize the process through which applications are processed at IRCC.
For what it's worth and for the sake of clarity, since being appointed as minister—or before, for that matter—I haven't had a relationship with representatives of McKinsey or Dominic Barton, if anybody was curious. The company did not advise me directly or influence the decision-making around our immigration levels plan. I know that has been the source of some commentary, but I would suggest it's without basis.
The decision made on immigration levels, the number of newcomers we welcome to Canada and how we envision the future of our country's population ultimately falls to me to determine in my capacity as the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship. Although this is a decision I've arrived at independently, I take advice from a number of different groups, whether that's department officials or, I would argue most importantly, organizations, stakeholders, provincial and territorial governments, businesses and people across Canada who understand the needs of Canada over the course of the next generation and how immigration may play a key role in determining our country's future. It was on the basis of those conversations and my independent reflection that we landed on appropriate levels for immigration as published in the immigration levels plan.
McKinsey was engaged—as I mentioned, before I was appointed as minister—on two instances through an open bidding process that was run by the department under its authority to do so. Those particular contracts were designed to provide advice around the modernization of the immigration system and to enhance digital services, which are rolling out as we speak, although I would suggest there are greater benefits to be seen in the years ahead as we move to a fully digitized system.
Over the course of the past few years, even pre-dating the pandemic, an unprecedented number of people have been choosing to come to Canada.
On the one hand, that's great for our country, but on the other hand, there's no doubt that IRCC's aging systems and processes simply couldn't keep up with the increased demand.
Like all departments and agencies, IRCC relies on different partnerships to improve the way we serve clients. Sometimes we have to rely on third parties to provide specialized expertise for specific and typically time-limited purposes.
That's why, in 2018, the department determined it needed specific expertise to review how it serves clients and to recommend improvements. This resulted in two contracts between 2018 and 2020 being awarded to McKinsey. It represented in those particular years, for what it's worth, less than 1% of the department's operating expenditures.
The first contract provided an assessment and a set of recommendations to improve digital and other services and to begin the digital transformation process, which is ongoing today.
While the department moved ahead to implement some of those recommendations, it established the second contract, again, on a competitive basis. This was to grow its internal capacity, help IRCC employees gain specialized expertise themselves and accelerate the department's ability to carry on with the work to transform the digital system that we're moving towards, with a focus on improving client service.
The work carried out as part of these contracts identified gaps and opportunities to improve service delivery. It also led to the development of a transformation strategy, complete with a step-by-step plan, and two new operating models: one to deliver more efficient processes and another to deliver digital solutions for IRCC's clients.
Folks, I expect I'm getting close to the end of my five minutes, so perhaps I'll end my comments there.
