Government Operations Committee on Oct. 26th, 2023

[Amir Morv]

Absolutely.

[Ritika Dutt]

Three weeks, I believe, is the timeline.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Yes, please. If there are issues, please let the clerk know.

We're down to the last 15 minutes, and we should be able to squeeze it in if we stick to our times.

Ms. Vignola, you have two and a half minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm basically going to make some comments.

Thank you very much, witnesses. What you are telling us today requires a lot of thought and courage. I say courage because you did what needed to be done, which was to identify irregularities in certain situations. As a result, you have been subjected to financial threats, which have materialized, since you have not been paid for all your work. Your identity was stolen and used without your consent. You went through some strange things, at the very least. You noticed that some of your emails were being tracked because of the subject matter. It's really strange. If we were in a less democratic country, I would understand, but we are in Canada, not in one of those countries, which I will not name.

I applaud your determination, which should permeate every public servant. I am talking about the determination to ensure that taxpayers' money is spent properly and responsibly. That is what you did, even though you are outside the machinery of government. Thank you for that. Thank you for keeping your head high and your back straight. It has to continue that way.

That's all for me, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

Thank you.

Mr. Johns.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

I'm going to follow that with the same thing. I can't thank you enough for speaking truth to power. It takes a lot of courage to do that. You really need to be recognized for that today.

Did you hear anything—Mr. Firth, or anything—that would concern you that there would be anything fishy going on, like something illegal or money moving around that wasn't documented, or anything like that?

[Ritika Dutt]

Mr. Firth literally told us that this is for more than just credit for Mr. MacDonald. Take what you will from that.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Okay.

Ms. O'Gorman and Mr. Ossowski testified the other day. Do you have any thoughts or concerns or maybe any comments on their testimony, which should be further examined?

[Amir Morv]

We both have very serious concerns about the testimony that President O'Gorman made two days ago. She specifically mentioned that the CBSA is “working with the RCMP” to obtain Botler's records. This, to us, is a very alarming attempt to obstruct justice. CBSA is not entitled...and they should not interfere with the RCMP investigation in this matter. I urge them not to basically interfere in any matter or request any kinds of records from the RCMP.

I confirmed with the RCMP, and they told me that the CBSA is not going to receive any records that are under criminal investigation with respect to Botler unless those records are going to be part of a judicial proceeding. We are very concerned about the kind of role that the CBSA may play in this investigation.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Hopefully, the RCMP are listening to today's testimony and have a change of mind.

Do you know where Mr. MacDonald is and if he's had a promotion lately, or anything like that?

[Amir Morv]

I believe he received a promotion, and he's now the assistant deputy minister of public health. I think he's in charge of the entire COVID task force.

[Gord Johns, NDP, Courtenay—Alberni, BC]

Can you speak a little bit more on your thoughts on that, just briefly?

[Amir Morv]

Well....

[Ritika Dutt]

It's difficult to see that people, who were openly committing acts of fraud on the government, would be rewarded, I would say.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly McCauley]

That is well summarized. Thanks very much.

Ms. Kusie, we should be able to get in five minutes, please.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you so much.

It should be evident to everyone in this room, as well as Canadians, that there is systematic corruption within this government. It should be absolutely evident after this meeting and your testimony here today.

Previous to today, we had identified identity theft, fraudulent forged résumés, contractual theft, fraudulent billing, price-fixing and collusion. You've given evidence of all of that today, and you're going to provide further evidence—thank you—with the documents that have been requested.

We saw that these three companies, which we've referred to, received $80.3 million last year alone. If we look at just the “ghost contractors” that you referred to in the first round, for which we determined the definition of and defined GC Strategies, we see that they received $43.6 million in the last three years. Taxpayers were defrauded potentially of $43.6 million. They were defrauded of this huge amount of money.

In my opinion, there is no doubt that systematic corruption exists. My question to you is this: After everything you've been through, why do you think this is happening?

[Amir Morv]

I believe the only reason that ghost contractors exist is to funnel the funds into accounts that are not traceable. That's the only logical reason. It's very difficult to understand how this government contracting worked, but what we realize is that it's more difficult to do things the wrong way than to actually do things the right way. The right way is very strict, but the way that these contracts are being awarded, they're completely being awarded by design.

You mentioned the figure of $43 million—that's what we know. The whole point of having ghost contracts is the amount that we don't know. We really don't know how these contracts, with other vendors we don't even know yet, have been funnelled through GC Strategies. Maybe GC Strategies received $46 million on paper, but maybe GC Strategies received $10 billion from all different sorts of professional services that we are not aware of, because we don't know—these are ghosts.

The only reason, again, to me, is the basically untraceable use of public funds.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

How do you think this could possibly be happening in the public service? What would be the incentive for public servants?

I was a public servant for close to 15 years. In fact, I was a management officer. I was a procurement officer at Global Affairs. There were very strict guidelines you had to follow for procuring services, for receiving those services, for verifying that you received those services and for paying for those services.

What would be the incentive for anyone in the Government of Canada? I think Canadian public servants are known for being hard-working individuals committed to this country. What on earth would cause a few bad apples to act in this manner, to act this way?

[Amir Morv]

There are actually few bad apples in the public service, as you mentioned. It's absolutely a very tiny faction within our public service, and I believe there are two reasons. One is personal benefit and the second is extortion. If you do something wrong and you have basically something compromising on yourself.... I believe these could be the main two: extortion or personal benefit. I think personal benefit is something that could be a cause of this.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

How do you think this is happening? How is this happening that there is this lack of oversight that allows these incredible amounts of funds to just go missing from Canadian taxpayers' pockets? How is this happening, do you think?

[Amir Morv]

That's our question too. We really don't know, and it's very difficult to believe that the system is designed in a way that this shouldn't happen. Actually what I'm seeing with all the subcontracting is that the system unfortunately is designed for this to happen.

[Ritika Dutt]

If I may add to that, the only reason that ghost contractors and contractors like the ones we were discussing today are able to operate as they do is that they have the support from factions within the government. If those did not exist, I do not believe that we would be seeing such egregious disrespect of taxpayer dollars without that internal protection.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

The government is allowing this ghost contracting to happen.

[Ritika Dutt]

Yes, that's correct. Factions within the government are allowing this.

[Stephanie Kusie, Conservative, Calgary Midnapore, AB]

Thank you.