Evidence of meeting #86 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 macdonald.
A video is available from Parliament.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
No, it was not.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Not to my knowledge.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Charles Sousa Liberal Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON
ArriveCAN discussions and the appointment of GC Strategies have nothing to do with the issues regarding Botler and their pilot research AI project. Is that correct?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
That is correct. The two are entirely different things. One is potentially to see if we can find a different way to address sexual misconduct. The other one was an application to handle COVID.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Charles Sousa Liberal Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON
Mr. Doan, is it normal to use contractors to assemble potential skills and individual firms and others to provide for the work?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Absolutely. We have very skilled public servants, but sometimes, depending on the urgency or type of skill, such as an emerging skill like cybersecure AI, we don't have the skills in-house, or it will take too much time to train. It's normal to look at staff augmentation and other vehicles to find those skills, those hard skills, to help complement, especially in urgent times. Something like the pandemic, I think, would qualify as extremely urgent.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Charles Sousa Liberal Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON
However, is it normal for a subcontractor like Botler to engage in work without a contract and without an understanding of what they were supposed to do?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
In terms of Botler and how that contracting and subcontracting would occur, unfortunately, in my understanding of this.... It would have to be confirmed with colleagues at PSPC. The agency deals with the main contractor. Who they subcontract out to and how many times they do that is not something we know. That is something that only PSPC, the contracting authority, would know.
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
12:20 p.m.
Conservative
November 14th, 2023 / 12:20 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Doan, you stated during your appearance on October 24 that you weren't involved in the decision to give a mandate to GC Strategies, adding that the decision had been made by members of a committee.
How many people were on that committee?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
Thank you for the question.
I would like to clarify something. As I said in my presentation, I made a technical policy decision. It led to the awarding of the contract to GC Strategies. I'm responsible for that decision.
As you'll see in the briefing binder that I provided, a lot of people worked around the clock, for two or three days, to put together a proposal that would identify which direction to take.
12:20 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
You talked about a committee, and I want to know how many people were on that committee. Was there one person, three, thousands?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
I'm sorry, but I don't recall. I don't recall using the word “committee”. In terms of governance, I want to make it clear that these are decisions that were made in a day or two. These were not normal decisions.
12:20 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
You made a strategic decision that led to the awarding of this contract, which is highly questionable. In addition, you have no idea of the process that led to the awarding of this $9 million contract or the number of people involved in the decision-making process.
It's hard to believe.
What are your comments on that?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
You will see in the briefing book that the initial request to develop an application to solve this problem was made on March 22, 2020. Two days later, we already had two options to consider. A day or two later, we had to make a strategic choice to determine the direction to give to the project.
12:20 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
You've made a strategic decision, and you acknowledge that you're responsible for it. That's great; it's a big step.
That decision was made by a group of people. You don't know who they are, you don't know how many people were in that group, and you don't know how the decision was made. And yet you claim to be responsible for that decision.
You'll agree with me that you have a strange definition of responsibility.
Is that correct?
12:20 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
You'll see in the documents provided the names of all the people who were involved in developing the proposals and options. This work has helped to find a solution to the problem and to choose a technological orientation.
For me, accountability means that I'm responsible for the policy decision I've made, and I stand by that.
12:25 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
Approximately how many technology experts were there at the Canada Border Services Agency?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
During the years I was vice-president, the number of employees varied from 1,200 to 1,400.
12:25 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
So we're looking for a needle in a haystack. You're telling us that you're responsible for a decision that was made by one of the 1,500 people who were at the agency.
As parliamentarians, that's what we're looking for.
Is that correct?
12:25 p.m.
Chief Technology Officer of the Government of Canada, Treasury Board Secretariat
No, sir, I'm not saying that we should look among 1,200 or 1,400 people.
You'll see in the documents provided the names of the main people who took part in research and development to identify the options. We know the names; we know who was involved in this work. We have all the e‑mails related to that.
