National Defence Committee on Oct. 5th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Ms. Normandin.

Ms. Mathyssen, you have two and a half minutes.

[Lindsay Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Just to return to “Strong, Secure, Engaged”, there was an initiative within it that said:

Grow and professionalize the defence procurement workforce in order to strengthen the capacity to manage the acquisition and support of today’s complex military capabilities. This includes the addition of over 60 procurement specialists and enhanced training and professional accreditation for defence procurement personnel.

However, we heard that there is a 30% vacancy rate for those defence procurement personnel.

When we are talking about policies, planning, your department's ability to do the work it needs to do, not skipping out on transparency, and the things we need to have for that openness in government, how are you able, with that 30% lack of personnel, to continue to work within the timelines we are hoping to have going forward?

[Troy Crosby]

Since “Strong, Secure, Engaged” was released, the materiel group at National Defence has grown by approximately 630 people. That said, the amount of work we are progressing with has increased dramatically and continues to grow with the NORAD modernization, the replacement of donated materiel, and the other projects.

It takes quite a while to grow somebody to take on project leadership or project management responsibilities for a large, complex program. We have a formal process of project management competency development that we operate inside the materiel group at DND. For someone to take on the most complex of our projects, it is generally a nine-year process of experience gained through increasing responsibility in more and more complex activities. We are always feeling the pressure to make sure we have the people we need.

We are continuing to recruit. We've actually just launched what we call an “academy”. It's not a building; it's a concept for procurement specialists within the group so that we have the people we're going to need to take on additional work.

In terms of the 30% shortfall, it's important to recognize that our organizational charts for a project are established at a moment in time at the beginning of the project, and they represent the high-water mark for the number of people who would be required—all the specialists—but not all of the specialists are required all of the time.

Right now, despite the shortfalls from a numerical point of view, I have no projects in my organization that are reporting red for human resource availability. There are quite a number reporting yellow. They are feeling the pressure. At times we do find ourselves challenged to find the very specialized subject matter expertise that is required at a moment in time to move a particular project forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

We'll have to leave the answer there.

Thank you, Ms. Mathyssen.

Mr. Bezan, you have five minutes.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Thank you, Chair.

I welcome our witnesses to the table.

Mr. Crosby, it's good to see you back here again.

We've had a number of witnesses come here, including ministers and the chief of the defence staff, talking about needing to move industry in Canada onto a war footing. Things are dangerous in the world right now with what's happening with the war in Europe, and of course the geopolitics being played in the South China Sea and in the Taiwan Strait.

Are your departments on a war footing? Have you guys made any changes to move Canada onto a war footing?

[Troy Crosby]

My organization responds to the Canadian Armed Forces' priorities from a procurement point of view and for the in-service support to the fleets that are assigned to operations. From a project perspective, we continue to come back to that.

In the case of Operation Reassurance, we have moved out quickly on urgent operational requirements that the Canadian Armed Forces have identified.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

At the same time, we have to fight using what we have, and we need to replace what we have. What are we doing to expedite the process of procurement, which is the subject of the study here right now, to make sure we get the kit that our troops need?

[Troy Crosby]

In the case of the urgent operational requirements that I just mentioned, there are three of them. The request for proposals have been released. We see ourselves being able to get through the procurement processes and deliver capability by midsummer of 2024. It comes down, in those cases, to being very disciplined in identifying the requirements that are needed for those operations, which is—

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

As we talk about in national defence, one of the complaints has been that too often we do too much Canadianization. Shipbuilding is a great example. Here we are 12 years down the road on the surface combatant and we still don't have a design finalized. What are we doing to make sure that we try to limit that type of interference, which slows down procurement?

[Troy Crosby]

On a case-by-case basis, we can avoid any type of Canadianization, but in other cases, when we're looking at long-term platform requirements that we're going to have in service in Canada for 30 years—

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

We may not have the time, though, in the world we live in today, to Canadianize all those platforms.

I'll give you a break, Mr. Crosby. Canadianization has been a complaint. We've already talked about the culture of risk aversion over at Public Services and Procurement Canada. What are we doing at Public Services and Procurement Canada to address the need to move onto a war footing and limit the amount of risk aversion we face?

[Simon Page]

That's a tough question because I wouldn't say that we're not doing anything hard specifically. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, I think of us as delivering through a system. This system needs refinement—there's no doubt about that—and continuous improvement.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

We need to know what sort of refinement so that we can make recommendations to the government.

[Simon Page]

One of the things we did—and Samantha and I both talked about this in our opening remarks—was take a risk-based approach, delegating more to PSPC and not having to go to the Treasury Board every time with a submission. This allows our colleagues at the Treasury Board to focus on other, bigger files. That is in play. That has matured quite a bit and has enabled—

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

To go to the Treasury Board, then, the complaint is that there's way too much red tape and that it requires way too much paperwork. Small businesses can't even afford to get into the competition. Also, given our RFP, what the States does in 100 pages.... We'd take 100,000 pages to make that request.

What are we doing at the Treasury Board to reduce the amount of red tape and reduce the rules that are impacting overall effectiveness in procurement in Canada?

[Samantha Tattersall]

I'll say a couple of things.

First of all, Treasury Board policy is principle-based now. We moved from a very prescriptive policy—it was something like 80 pages long—to a very short principle-based policy to give more flexibility. If you ask my colleagues whether Treasury Board policy is the big inhibitor, I would hope they say that it's not the biggest inhibitor.

When you talk about the approval process and what comes to the Treasury Board and what doesn't, we are always working with our colleagues to ask, “In this procurement, are there exceptions or flexibility that you need that we can propose to the Treasury Board?” When you talk about defence procurement, it's quite large. What are the big complex ones? Then we have an ongoing conversation about where exceptions and flexibility may be needed.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Thank you, Mr. Bezan.

Ms. O'Connell, welcome back to the committee. You have five minutes.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I guess you can't get rid of me that easily.

Thank you to our witnesses for being here.

When I was on this committee, a lot of these issues were brought up in other studies as well. In my role with cybersecurity in the study this committee did on cybersecurity, I saw that the issues around technology are of quite serious importance, especially these days.

One of the criticisms was about the length of time to go through the procurement process, in particular for DND. Between the time that process occurs and the delivery of whatever is procured, the technology becomes obsolete.

I'll leave it to any of you who want to take on this question. What is being done to address the fact that, every single day, technology is advancing and evolving? How are we creating a process that allows for us to stay up to date and to deliver in a meaningful time frame?

[Troy Crosby]

Again, the focus is on continuous capability sustainment, with the objective of quickly delivering to the Canadian Armed Forces an effective capability that we can then evolve over time through a spiral development approach. That is really where our minds are right now.

We have examples where this has worked effectively. There is an integrated soldier system project that has seen three spirals of incremental capability released to the Canadian Armed Forces. It has also given them the opportunity to influence each subsequent spiral over time. I think it's a model that can work for us.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

You talked about examples, but do you actually have data? If you're in the space of purchasing something that requires technology dealing with cybersecurity and you would need the most up-to-date.... This would apply to everything, not just cybersecurity or technology. Do you have data you can measure? Let's say it took us five years to develop a software program or to procure a software program for whatever project was needed, and then two years later we had to update that. Do you have data demonstrating that you're improving in this area, and anything to show some transparency as to whether we are keeping up with the technological trends and capabilities that are needed?

[Troy Crosby]

We have conducted a review of the procurement process as it transitions through its major phases—identification and options analysis, definition implementation and where the time is spent—depending on the complexity of the projects. There are quite a few variables at play out there. Some of the policy changes and enablers that we've seen brought in have not been through enough projects yet for us to measure whether or not they're having a serious impact statistically that we could demonstrate, but anecdotally we do see progress.

[Jennifer O'Connell, Liberal, Pickering—Uxbridge, ON]

For the point of this question, and it could be related to others, are there categories or recommendations that we could make to ensure we are not taking so long to procure something that by the time we receive it and are able to use it, it's out of date? Could there be recommendations under certain categories to ensure the process is streamlined?

[Troy Crosby]

Mr. Page and Ms. Tattersall mentioned some of the risk-based approaches. I think the context was largely around contracting authorities. There are also expenditure authorities that need to be sought by the Department of National Defence. We're applying the same sorts of delegation instruments whereby we're right-sizing the process. Rather than making a full Treasury Board submission, perhaps we could have approval from the Minister of National Defence in a thinner submission, or from the deputy minister in a thinner submission, or from me.

We are working on some of those processes. They are there, and that will continue as we get comfortable with them and know where the flexibilities are to continue to progress down that path. I think it's most important, though, that we don't try to find one solution that fits all defence procurement. If you're buying a surface combatant, that is very different from a low-complexity, relatively low dollar value procurement. I'd say that buying surface combatants and fighter jets will always be complex and time-consuming, but we really need to get better at keeping those platforms relevant once they're delivered.

[The Chair, Liberal, John McKay]

Colleagues, we have time for one more two-minute round. I'll go to Mr. Bezan and Ms. Lalonde for two minutes each, then to Mr. Kelly and then to one final Liberal.

With that, Mr. Bezan, you have two minutes.

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

I want to get down to how your departments work across your silos. In the past we had a PCO secretariat to take on defence procurement. There has been a lot of talk from witnesses here about ministerial accountability and having one point of ministerial accountability. There has also been talk of making sure the Prime Minister is engaged and sees this as a priority.

Can you comment on how this can be better managed, from today versus what is possible in the future? Do we need a PCO secretariat?