Public Accounts Committee on April 9th, 2024

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Are you able to enumerate the occasions on which that occurred with government officials, who the government officials were and what gifts were given?

[Nicole Foster]

Our system is designed to identify who the officials were and what the gifts were.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Can you provide that information to the committee, please?

[Nicole Foster]

I can follow up with that information.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

Thank you very much.

Just to be precise, were there any government officials and Amazon employees who met outside of government offices? If so, can those details be included in your return to the committee?

[Nicole Foster]

In the normal course of business, meetings may take place outside of government offices. They may take place in our corporate offices, they may take place—

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

I understand the concept. I'm asking if you'll provide the details of those meetings in the return that you committed to with respect to your previous answer.

[Nicole Foster]

I would have to verify this, but I do not believe we track that information in terms of the locations where meetings take place.

[Michael Barrett, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes, ON]

If it exists, will you provide it?

[Nicole Foster]

I don't think we have a regular system to track that, but if we do have it, I would be happy to provide it.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Up next is Ms. Bradford.

You have the floor for five minutes.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you so much to the witnesses for coming today.

This question is for the representatives of each of the companies. For the record, how long have you been doing work with the Government of Canada?

[John Weigelt]

I'm not sure if it counts, but I was in uniform with the government from 1986 until 2000, I worked for Treasury Board until 2003 and I've been working at Microsoft for 20 years since then helping the government.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

You have been with Microsoft for 20 years.

[Mike Abbott]

We have worked with the Government of Canada for about 10 years.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Ms. Foster, what is your answer to that question?

[Nicole Foster]

Prior to the framework agreement in 2020, we would have done very minimal work. We launched our infrastructure in Canada in 2012, but it took some time for procurement avenues to become available in Canada.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

I just wanted to give you a chance to complete an answer. I think you got cut off before. Could you please expand on the difference between subcontracting and being a customer directly?

[Nicole Foster]

It's a legal differentiation. When you're a subcontractor that means you adopt the original terms of the original contract.

In the case of cloud computing that is often very difficult, or was very difficult prior to the cloud framework agreements.

The Government of Canada did not have existing legal frameworks for procuring cloud. As I mentioned before, procuring cloud is very different from procuring hardware or software. Quite often a lot of the terms in traditional IT contracts would be very inappropriate for cloud. We would not have assumed the responsibilities as a subcontractor for those terms and services. Instead, those relationships would have been treated as a customer of ours and not as subcontractor to their contract.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Okay.

I understood from what you said before that the work with the ArriveCAN app still continues and they are still being billed for the cloud. The cloud relationship continues.

Is that like a monthly subscription or it based on the time or the usage?

[Nicole Foster]

It's based on consumption or usage. It's actually an ideal application for cloud in the sense that as your usage increases, for example, with increased travellers around holiday times and you reach peak, the system can accommodate those peak usages. When you don't use those peak usages you will only be billed for the use that you require at that time.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Is there a minimum charge?

[Nicole Foster]

No. It's purely usage.

[Valerie Bradford, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Was Amazon involved in creating the terms of your contract originally?

[Nicole Foster]

The cloud framework agreement is the same agreement that all the cloud service providers have signed, the basics of the agreement. There was a lot of education that had to happen with the Government of Canada to understand how to procure cloud in the lead-up to the signing of that agreement.