Evidence of meeting #97 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 business.
A video is available from Parliament.
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
I was asked by Botler to draft a letter for Chrystia Freeland. That letter went from me to GC Strategies to the Botler executive, and they submitted the letter.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
If your contract was with Botler, why would you send it to GC Strategies?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
I was directed to do so by a Botler executive.
Liberal
Majid Jowhari Liberal Richmond Hill, ON
A Botler executive directed you to draft a letter and send it to GC Strategies.
Conservative
Conservative
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Brennan, if I understand correctly, the Botler AI contract was reached with Botler AI alone.
Who put the two of you in contact? Can you remind us?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
I was put in contact with Botler AI through GC Strategies.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
How did GC Strategies introduce you to Botler AI? How did it show Botler AI how important you were?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
GC Strategies introduced me to Botler based on my background in business processes for engineering. I guess they felt it might be a good fit.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
According to GC Strategies, Botler AI needed your expertise to restructure those processes. That's why they put you in touch.
Can you tell us the general topic of the research you had to do?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
If I may say so, the industry in and of itself and primarily the Government of Canada are facing significant fines or having to fund, if you will, all kinds of harassment issues, and this was an opportunity, if you will, to proactively look at that. That was what I believe Botler's value proposition was—to proactively look at managing harassment.
Bloc
Julie Vignola Bloc Beauport—Limoilou, QC
To that extent, your research consisted in compiling data on the number of harassment cases to be revealed. Is that correct?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
My background is in business architecture. The federal government follows several frameworks. I believe you have an IT background. For those frameworks, the data would have to match, as would the infrastructure and all the associated processes. I was engaged to investigate how those processes could incorporate the proactive management of HR issues.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Kelly McCauley
Thank you very much.
Mr. Johns, go ahead for two and a half minutes, please.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Thank you.
Mr. Brennan, I asked you about who your good friend in the chief of the defence staff's office is, because I want to find out some more about sensitive information from DND. Have you ever shared any sensitive information from DND with outside parties?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
If I was contracted to do so, yes.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
There's an excerpt from a call from Mr. Firth on January 26, 2021, regarding you. Mr. Firth stated, “He got that $5 billion use case pushed through. And then he also, the same time as well, the stuff that he's done for DND that he can tell us about, is pretty huge. That I know a little bit about when he's had a few scotches....”
Can you speak about what this is related to and how you feel about this information being spoken to publicly?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
Sure. I don't know how to respond to that. I can't comment, because it's a third party comment that I can't comment on.
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Have you ever shared information from DND with outside parties?
Professional Consultant, As an Individual
I have not, unless I've been contracted to do so.
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Have you ever reached out to government officials or to officials on behalf of private companies when you did not have a contract with said department or officials?
NDP
Gord Johns NDP Courtenay—Alberni, BC
Okay. I have an excerpt from an email from you from February 5, 2021, in which you state, “I have calls into Health Canada (mental healt), PSPC/TBS (accessibility/Yasmine Laroche, TBS), and Privy Council (racism). Coming together, this is shaping-up to be a 'whitepaper' and will need to cull content to be more succinct.”
To go back to the fact that you were not on this contract, why would you be reaching out to these officials if you were not on the contract?