Government Operations Committee on Oct. 31st, 2023

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Yeo, you represent a two-person company that receives contracts and then subcontracts. You've received millions of dollars from taxpayers for the process of receiving contracts and then subcontracting.

What would you say you do here?

[David Yeo]

Chair and honourable member, you ask about what I do, but I have to go back to the beginning. The amount of effort and—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I don't actually think you do. I'm not looking for prevarication or distraction.

What is it that you do for the Government of Canada in exchange for millions of dollars?

[David Yeo]

I don't know if it's an exchange for millions of dollars because there is so much overhead to running a bricks-and-mortar business here in Ottawa. There are expenses relating to indigenous employees that I have and indigenous consultants that we pay—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Sir, you don't have employees. There are two of you who are partners.

[David Yeo]

I do, and they're indigenous.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You have two employees. That's what you told the committee earlier.

[David Yeo]

Yes, that's correct.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

What is it that you do?

[David Yeo]

What is it that I do? I manage—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

What does your company do?

[David Yeo]

You're asking two things there.

What I do as an executive on the board of directors for Dalian is look at governance and the way the company is run on a daily basis. I've earned that by building the business over 23 years.

As for what we do—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You're a company with two people, so I appreciate that you have to pay office expenses and you have to manage your partner's activities, I suppose. But what do you do? What does your company do? What value does it produce? What is it that you do?

[David Yeo]

Our value-add really is in the area of project management and contract management as it relates to federal government contracting in the—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay, so the federal government gives you a contract. You give the contract to somebody else, and you're telling me that the value you add—

[David Yeo]

No, no.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You subcontract to someone else, and you're telling me that the value you add is in the process of project management. What does that mean? What do you do?

We were told earlier that the subcontractor deals directly with the federal government in terms of many of the details, so what do you do?

[David Yeo]

On a daily basis, that's true. The subcontractor does deal with the task authorization or the technical authority on a daily basis. But in behind all of that is the plethora...whether it's security clearances, billing, ensuring that the actual contract.... We're the prime on the contract, so we are also ultimately responsible for the overarching contract management of everything that goes on.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I understand that you're the prime on the contract, which means that you collect the money, but if the federal government is dealing directly with the subcontractors and if there have been various problems along the way that have been identified in terms of the results anyways, I'll ask it again, what do these words that you're saying actually mean? What is it that you do here?

[David Yeo]

I will pass this off to Colin [Inaudible—Editor].

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I'm actually interested in what you do first, Mr. Yeo.

[David Yeo]

I have answered that. I am an executive on the board of directors for Dalian, and I maintain all of the governance as it relates to the PSAB and make sure that the company is absolutely in line, in step, with everything that relates to procurement and government contracting within the federal government.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

You don't actually make anything or produce anything, right? You're making sure of all these things, but fundamentally—

[David Yeo]

We're providing a service that [Inaudible—Editor].

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

What is that service? If Stephanie gives me $100 to paint her fence and then I hire Larry for $50 to paint the fence, what have I done? I've just received money and then hired someone else to do the same thing.

You can call that subcontracting. You can call that project management, if you want, but I haven't done anything, right? You don't actually do anything for the money you receive, right?