Yes.
Mr. Pitfield.
Evidence of meeting #39 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was costs.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #39 for National Defence in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was costs.
A video is available from Parliament.
4:50 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Infrastructure and Environment, Department of National Defence
At National Defence we have a policy where when moneys come back to the department from the disposal or sale of real property they're reinvested in real property. In this case, the $15 million will go to cover leases in the Ottawa area and some will go to cover remediation of contaminated lands. I have a list in front of me here that I can't find right now. Basically, at the end of the day our intention here is that we take moneys and we repurpose it to continue reinvesting.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Peter Kent
That is time. Thank you.
Ms. Murray, please, you have five minutes.
4:50 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you.
I'm going to start by saying that today is Navy Appreciation Day, so I'm going to express my appreciation for the good work of the Royal Canadian Navy and especially for the men and women in uniform who do that service for Canadians.
Last week, Vice-Admiral Norman acknowledged that delays in replacing ships and the retirement of four ships was going to be creating some real challenges for having a fully functioning navy in terms of being able to resupply our ships and in terms of aerial defence with the destroyers, with there being a five to seven, eight, nine years' gap in having essential ships in the navy.
Are there any short-term solutions to that problem expressed in the supplementary estimates?
4:50 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of National Defence
Fundamentally, I don't think so, Mr. Chairman. What we're trying to do, and as I think Admiral Norman said, is that we are using the assets that we have now and we're prioritizing their tasking. The frigates are coming off-line now, as the minister intimated earlier. We now have three submarines operating—
4:50 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you. I have a few more questions, so I'm really looking for just a very focused answer to my questions.
Secondly, there was a document leaked that had been prepared by the ADM materiel that talked about DND's procurement organization needing $3 billion to make its promised purchases but only $2.3 billion were available for those purchases, so clearly there is a gap. Is that shortfall addressed in these figures of the supplementary estimates?
4:50 p.m.
RAdm Patrick Finn Chief of Staff, Materiel Group, Department of National Defence
Thank you for the question. Yes, some of the money in here actually comes to the maintenance that we're talking about there.
If I could just say very quickly, the $3 billion is an overall estimate of what we would need, not necessarily what we could execute with industry, so the $2.3 billion was the initial and there's some top-up in here.
4:50 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you.
Also, those leaked reports talked about big morale problems, attrition, burnout, and the upcoming exodus of many skilled employees in the procurement branch creating a significant risk to program execution. That came from the department. Is that addressed in the supplementary estimates?
4:50 p.m.
Chief of Staff, Materiel Group, Department of National Defence
There is nothing specific in the supplementary estimates. That is our human resource plan, where we define potential future states and risks. It also contains a number of things that we are doing to mitigate against those risks.
4:50 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you very much.
I want to talk a bit about spending lapses, and my question will be on how much of the proposed authorities to date are planned to be lapsed. The context is that there has been major funding lapsed over the past number of years. In fact, about $14 billion has been either lapsed or are in the budget cuts of the last three years of $4.6 billion. We know that the monies authorized and planned and announced are often clawed back and not available to the Canadian Armed Forces for expenditure.
Is a lapsing of the funding that's being authorized here already built into the plan, and if so, how much?
4:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of National Defence
Mr. Chairman, could I ask Mr. Lindsey to answer?
4:55 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Chief Financial Officer, Department of National Defence
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Like all government departments and agencies, DND has the authority every year to carry forward some certain amount of money. In the case of DND, that is 2.5% of our operating budget and our capital budget. It is our assumption that because of events beyond our control each year, we will carry forward some proportion of that 2.5%.
4:55 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Thank you.
I want to point out that spending lapses have represented 20% of DND's capital budget since 2009, compared to an average of 2% between 1973 and 2006. This has been a major source of savings for this government to be able to make other election promises.
4:55 p.m.
Liberal
Joyce Murray Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
Are we expecting to see more lapses in the order of 20%, or are you planning for a lower level of lapsing?
4:55 p.m.
Assistant Deputy Minister, Chief Financial Officer, Department of National Defence
We don't plan on capital lapses.
When suppliers to DND fail to deliver what they have contracted to do, we don't pay them. That is beyond our control. The money that we do not pay the contractor is carried forward to the future year to pay for the item when it is delivered.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Peter Kent
That's time, Ms. Murray.
Mr. Opitz, please, you have five minutes.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Ted Opitz Conservative Etobicoke Centre, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I note that DND is asking for the authority to transfer more than $3.3 million to other federal government departments and some agencies, and some of that includes $962,000, for example, to Shared Services Canada for information technology infrastructure for the military personnel management capability transformation project.
Could you comment on that and tell me what your end state is with that project?
4:55 p.m.
Deputy Minister, Department of National Defence
By way of a bit of background, Mr. Chair, you'll be aware that it was decided some time ago that the non-secure, beneath the top secret level communications capacity of the Government of Canada, will be centralized in Shared Services Canada. We have an ongoing program, beyond what was initially transferred to Shared Services Canada, to make sure they have the resources to execute various programs on our behalf. All this is doing is something along those lines.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative
Ted Opitz Conservative Etobicoke Centre, ON
I'll refer to CSE now. It is requesting approximately $8.2 million in funding for its long-term accommodation project, and over $1.6 million for the implementation of a risk mitigation framework for telecommunications networks.
Could you explain in some detail how these additional funds are going to be spent and applied?
