Health Committee on Dec. 4th, 2023

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Okay.

In November 2023, just a month ago, a former Parliamentary Budget Officer, Kevin Page, was quoted in the National Post saying, “It seems wrong that the PHAC refuses to answer your questions about how money has been spent or written off”.

Similarly, the current Parliamentary Budget Officer, Yves Giroux, commented that the government's initial refusal to disclose details about the $150 million lost due to the unfulfilled contract with the vendor was “highly unusual”.

Do you agree with that assessment?

[Andrea Andrachuk]

The Government of Canada is very careful to respect confidentiality agreements included in the contracts. The government has provided fully unredacted copies to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts as well as to the Auditor General to be inspected.

Officials from Public Services and Procurement Canada appeared—

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

If that's the case.... You interchangeably say you can't do it because of confidentiality and then you contradict yourself by saying that you gave the full, unredacted contracts—and you're here today talking about the contract.

I'm not clear—

[Andrea Andrachuk]

Those were all provided with appropriate confidentiality agreements in place with those who were viewing those agreements. The information they received was maintained confidential.

There was also a redacted copy of the seven advance purchase agreements provided to this committee earlier.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Finally, given the grave impact of tobacco on public health and the well-documented history of malfeasance from the tobacco industry, can you explain why the Government of Canada didn't take a strong position by refusing to enter into a contract with a company that had such strong ties to an international tobacco producer who is linked to a known carcinogen?

[Andrea Andrachuk]

The main goal of the Government of Canada was to secure safe and effective vaccines for Canadians as early as possible. The procurement strategy taken was all with that goal in mind. That is why there was a diverse portfolio of seven different vaccines pursued in order to get best chances. Given that there was a lot of risk at the time, we didn't know which vaccines, if any, would get Health Canada approval, and even if they did, we didn't know when they would be available.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

Thank you, Mr. Davies.

Thank you to all of our witnesses.

That concludes the round of questions.

Colleagues, I remind you that we're meeting on Wednesday evening from 6:30 to 9:30. There's one hour on this study and two hours on women's health.

To all of our witnesses today, thank you so much for your service to Canadians. Thank you so much for being available to come to committee and for answering our questions so patiently. This is our first hour on this topic, and there will be several others, so, once again, it's a good foundation for us to work from. We really appreciate your being here.

Is it the will of the committee to adjourn the meeting?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sean Casey]

We're adjourned.