Public Accounts Committee on Oct. 28th, 2009

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Briefly, how will they do that?

[Cassie Doyle]

I want to be clear. The centre of expertise, which we set up in September 2006, is run at the director level. It's chaired by the director of financial management, with one of our legal advisers and others in the program in financial management. What it does is provide the first level of oversight.

The centre is for all grants and contributions over $100,000. That ensures that there are many eyes. The village, if you will, is now taking more shared accountability for the design of the contribution agreement and then for the follow-through on the tracking and monitoring.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

So anything over $100,000 goes to an ADM committee, and they review them and are looking for these kinds of problems.

[Cassie Doyle]

Yes, the ADM-level committee is the transfer payment review committee—

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

So it's the same committee. Okay.

[Cassie Doyle]

No, it's a different committee. I apologize; it's a different committee. That committee deals with any contract over $1 million or any contract that's referred to it by the centre of excellence as constituting a higher level of risk.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

So the ADMs are then responsible.

If this were ever to happen again, you would know where to go and who was accountable for this; is that safe to say?

[Cassie Doyle]

Yes.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Because you have brought in these new procedures, I don't think it would be a surprise to anybody that you have spotted a potential conflict of interest that is ongoing right now. I would view it as a good thing, because you're being cautious. There is an abundance of caution; is that fair to say?

[Cassie Doyle]

Yes, I believe it is due diligence.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

What is a “high-risk agreement over $100,000”, something that you would give special scrutiny to?

[Cassie Doyle]

I would say that in one case it could pertain to the potential recipient of a contribution agreement.

One thing we Identified through the internal audit back in 2006 is that wherever there is evidence that a company has been set up for the express and singular purpose of receiving a contribution agreement from NRCan, that would certainly be a risk that would be referred to the transfer review committee.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Thank you, Mr. Young.

I want to put a question to Ms. Doyle and Mr. Fadden and Ms. Buckley concerning the individual, Peter Middleton, the consultant who was on both sides of this. My experience is that you get rid of these characters on one end, but they have a habit of resurfacing in other areas of Ottawa. Does any of you know of any circumstances in which this individual has resurfaced as a consultant working for any other department or agency in Ottawa? My experience is that they always crop up like dandelions.

[Richard Fadden]

No, Chairman.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

What about the person dismissed from the department? Has he or she resurfaced in Ottawa as a consultant, so far as you are aware?

[Cassie Doyle]

I am not aware of its happening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Mr. Fadden?

[Richard Fadden]

No, sir.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Do you know of any information on these two characters?

[Carol Buckley]

I have no information.

[The Chair, Liberal, Shawn Murphy]

Mr. Saxton.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will finish by asking the deputy first of all to comment.

You came in 2006. You inherited this mess. You have taken actions and significant measures to clean it up. I'd like to know, if you could just highlight them again for the committee, the measures you have taken since you came in 2006, please.

[Cassie Doyle]

Thank you very much for the question.

At the risk of repeating myself, the two key mechanisms are two oversight committees. One is the centre of excellence, run through our financial management branch, and the other is the transfer payment review committee, which operates at the ADM level under the ADM of corporate management and shared services at NRCan.

In addition to those two oversight committees, we also have put in place a new policy on contributions and grants and some very detailed checklists, which are used to ensure that all of the areas, particularly of the policy, are being complied with in the development of a contribution agreement.

I would add that there is additional language in our contribution agreements themselves. They have been enhanced with three specific sections now on conflict of interest.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

You have a very high degree of confidence, then, that this cannot happen again.