Public Accounts Committee on April 20th, 2021

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Stewart, I just want to understand the logic. You say you were happy with the economic update last fall because there was additional money to help you more. Does that mean that you were short of money? At the same time, you say there was no shortage of money before the pandemic. So what are you going to do with the new money?

[Iain Stewart]

Substantial money has been provided, Madam Chair.

If you look at the public accounts for the Public Health Agency of Canada, you'll see that we received a lot of additional resources to help us buy vaccines, get personal protective equipment, and so on, and, yes, we did receive operating resources to increase the scale of our staff as well.

I think that kind of indicates the level of resources required for this moment in time.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

It's April 20, the day after the tabling of a historic budget with billions of dollars in investments. Is there anything you, the Public Health Agency of Canada, are missing to get through the pandemic?

[Iain Stewart]

Where we have needed resources, they have been provided.

Going back to my overall theme, Madam Chair, about the fact that the pandemic evolves and the needs evolve, my experience since I started on September 28 has been that if we need something, people support us.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I thank you for the answer to my question.

I will address Mr. Ossowski and Mr. Vinette from the Canada Border Services Agency.

From day one of the health crisis in March 2020, there was tremendous pressure to repatriate Canadian citizens abroad. We saw countries literally closing their borders and airports. This complicated this massive task. The more time passed, the longer it took for Canada to also close its borders, which had become real sieves, let's face it.

To what extent can you assess, after the fact, the consequences of these delayed decisions?

[John Ossowski]

Madam Chair, from the outset the government worked closely with our public health advisers, both provincially and federally, to respond to the threat of the virus. It was evidence-based, based on scientific advice, so it was done in a very step-wise manner.

We started with our first screening measure January 22, screening travellers who had come from the Wuhan region, and it has progressed through 47 different orders in council to date as we have adjusted to the changing requirements on the ground.

We had a good plan in place. We've had a pandemic plan at the agency since 2012 and we've updated it and exercised it, so I am grateful for the Auditor General's comments about how well we responded.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Ossowski.

Do you believe that decisions that came from the top were communicated too late? Earlier, I asked Mr. Stewart if the Public Health Agency of Canada had made recommendations to ban non-essential travel altogether. He said no. So I'm trying to understand. I'm trying to figure that out.

We let people travel abroad. We gave ourselves targets to make sure that those who came back into the country were quarantined, but we didn't meet the targets. So we continued to bring people back into the country, even though we knew we were not able to enforce their quarantine.

In your opinion, would limiting non-essential travel have helped you in your work? Fewer people would have returned to the country, so you would have been better able to enforce the Quarantine Act.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly Block]

May we have a very short answer, please?

[John Ossowski]

We did ban non-essential travel, but Canadians have a right of entry to Canada. If you're coming back, we have to respect your charter and mobility rights. Even though we banned foreign nationals for non-essential travel, certainly Canadians all over the world had a right of entry.

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly Block]

Thank you very much.

We will now go to Mr. Bachrach for six minutes.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to pick up where I left off, discussing the rapid risk assessment.

Mr. Stewart, in your response you indicated that with the rapid risk assessments, the Public Health Agency of Canada was essentially experimenting—in your words—with an unproven methodology. I think when we read Ms. Hogan's report we can see very clearly that the experiment failed.

Did the failure of that experiment cost Canadian lives?

[Iain Stewart]

It's in the Auditor General's report that we tried to use these methodologies, so it's a matter of public record. Overall, there has been a loss of Canadian lives arising from the pandemic.

Madam Chair, as previously mentioned, that of course is a tragedy and unacceptable to all of us.

I think it would be difficult to know the connection that you're proposing, sir, but we do note the importance of ensuring that our efforts are better, and that we're making a more constructive and positive impact in fighting the pandemic.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Stewart, in paragraph 8.62 in the Auditor General's report it states:

We found that for more than 10 years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the agency had identified gaps in its existing infrastructure but had not implemented solutions to improve it. In its last 2 strategic plans for surveillance, the agency identified several capacity deficiencies in the information technology infrastructure used to support its public health surveillance activities....

How could this be allowed to happen? Did PHAC underestimate the importance of addressing these deficiencies?

[Iain Stewart]

Madam Chair and honourable members, the infrastructure being referred to is IT infrastructure. A lot of effort has been made to address and remediate the issues that were raised by the Auditor General, and more work is proposed.

I mentioned earlier that in fact new resources and a new unit have been created in that exact area. We've been working closely with the provinces and have a shared plan about how we're going to approach data, which touches on infrastructure like our data portal. We have an outreach and a consultation agenda to try to identify how to improve it.

We take it very seriously, and we see it, as you're suggesting, as an area for improvement.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Stewart, I appreciate that a lot of work is currently being done, obviously knowing the impact of the pandemic and the severity of things, but this is something that goes back 10 years.

In the 10 years between when it was first identified—this information infrastructure gap and the Auditor General's report—what actions did PHAC take to resolve those deficiencies that were identified?

[Iain Stewart]

Madam Chair, I could maybe say two things.

First of all, I'd be happy to come back to you in writing with a narrative on the 10 years with respect to infrastructure investments and activity done. I think that might be the kind of thing you're looking for that very squarely responds to your question.

Secondly, I would point out that IT infrastructure is a boundless frontier.

In my last job at the National Research Council, we were forever trying to keep ourselves current and, in fact, at the leading edge of IT infrastructure. For a public health agency, that's true as well.

May I come back to you with a chronology in that regard?

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

That's fine. Maybe I can ask one follow-up question.

Was additional funding ever requested in budget submissions to address those gaps over that 10-year period and were those budget submissions approved?

[Iain Stewart]

We'll come back to you in that regard, sir.

Thank you very much.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Okay. Thank you.

Turning to Ms. Hogan, you referenced a 2009 report by the Auditor General's office related to pandemic preparedness.

Did the Public Health Agency of Canada also accept all recommendations in that report?

[Karen Hogan]

In one of my previous comments, I think I referenced a 1999 report, a 2002 report and a 2008 Auditor General's report related to this, in case you're going to go look for them. It is my understanding that in all of those cases, our recommendations were agreed to, and actions expected to be taken.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Were the actions that were committed to followed through on? Were the recommendations implemented from those reports?

[Karen Hogan]

What we saw in 2002 was that not everything from 1999 had been addressed and so on. What we're finding now is the same thing: There were actions taken in some areas, but not completely.

As we identified in the current audit, some key areas, like coming to a mutual understanding with federal, provincial and territorial health agencies about the kind of information to be shared, how it should be shared and when it should be shared, were not taken care of.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Stewart, there are these reports that Ms. Hogan has indicated. Your agency accepted all of the recommendations in all of those reports, yet those recommendations weren't implemented.

What I heard you say in your opening comments was that you accepted these recommendations and that they were going to be implemented. Why should the Canadian public trust that this time is different?

[The Chair, Conservative, Kelly Block]

We need a very short answer, Mr. Stewart.

[Iain Stewart]

Well, Madam Chair, we've set out in our response to the Auditor General the plans that we intend to undertake.

To the honourable member's question, we will be responding as we set out in those documents. There are other times and events where not all recommendations could be addressed specifically. We can explore in that chronology what we've been missing.