Public Accounts Committee on Sept. 3rd, 2024

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, the NRC isn't involved with the current files of SDTC. I'm in no position to answer the member's question. I'm sorry.

[Larry Brock, Conservative, Brantford—Brant, ON]

Well, presumably you'll be answering these questions at the end of Q4. Are you not talking now about what steps the government is taking to recover taxpayer funds?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, we anticipate that the files that will be transferred to us will be ones that are in good standing and that we can carry forward, and that we will continue to administer the agreements that are transferred to us and the relationship with those clients. That's how the process has been structured.

Questions as to recovery and so on are, of course, best addressed to other parties.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Weiler, you have the floor again for five minutes, please.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

I really appreciate the answers being given by our witnesses today. I want to pick up on the line of questioning that my colleague Ms. Bradford had on the HR violations at SDTC.

Can you speak to any strategies you have in place to investigate and resolve the allegations of HR violations within SDTC, going forward?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I don't think it will be the place of NRC to investigate violations related to a prior employer. Obviously our jurisdiction will be with our employees, the people who join the NRC, and then how we work with them to have a good workplace in which they feel they can do their job, do it best and uphold the trust the public has placed in us, but NRC has no role in terms of investigative activities involving SDTC, the foundation.

I think those are questions that have been looked at under prior processes that have been discussed here. I'm not directly in a position to speak to that work.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Okay. Within NRC and IRAP and among your employees, how are whistle-blowers protected?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, there are a number of levels, of course, that are important. There are individuals, certainly, who might feel there could be reprisals or actions taken if they raised concerns.

As I mentioned, we have a process whereby employees can disclose concerns. They come to our most senior ethics officer. The concerns are reviewed and investigated, as one would expect. The facts are established, and then resolutions to those issues are come up with in cases where that is warranted. That process also protects those employees from any actions being taken because they've raised questions or concerns.

Then there's obviously an act of Parliament, a law, that provides them that protection as well. It applies to all of our employees, and they can go to the parliamentary officer to raise concerns if they wish to have those things investigated.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you.

I'd like to change gears a bit. With regard to both IRAP and SDTC, I'm wondering if you could speak to how those programs may interact and complement each other in terms of their impacts on the innovation supply chain, because it does seem to me that there is some level of complementarity.

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I think if you look at the funding that NRC IRAP provides compared to the funding that SDTC has provided, essentially there is a sort of a continuum of support in which NRC IRAP would provide a smaller amount of funding at an earlier stage of a company, and then SDTC would provide more funding and obviously work at a subsequent point in the business's evolution.

It's not a perfect continuum and it's not linear in any way, and there would be cases in which clients of IRAP would also be clients of SDTC.

Further to the question, we can certainly see how we can provide a continuum of support within the programming that we'll be offering to clean-tech innovators from the earliest stage to the later stages in their development and growth.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

When both are merged under the Canada Innovation Corporation, how do you see this framework supporting innovation and growth in the Canadian economy writ large?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, the question of how the Canada Innovation Corporation would work was the subject of a blueprint issued by the government some time ago to explain its goals and its objectives of providing a continuum of support to innovators and entrepreneurs. It would, according to that blueprint, provide support from the earlier stage to later stages, at which more significant funding might be involved, in terms of particular technologies, particular risks, things that are hard to get up off the ground, and for which public support would be warranted.

The purpose of the company, the Crown corporation, would be to provide a continuum of support to those innovators and entrepreneurs. Bringing SDTC into NRC IRAP would be sort of a first stage of that system, within which we would start at the early stage, create a relationship with the company and provide support through the regular IRAP, but also be able to work with them later on so that they became sustainable businesses as they grew and the challenges were increased as those firms were scaled up.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you.

If you have a short one, go ahead.

[Patrick Weiler, Liberal, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

I'll just end it there.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Okay. Thank you very much.

We're now going to begin our fourth and final round. We are going back to Mr. Genuis, who is no longer on his porch and now appears to be in the House of Commons.

I'll turn it over to you, Garnett, for five minutes. Go ahead, please.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. The sun was in my eyes.

It's very clear that this is the same old SDTC, despite claims about changes. This NDP-Liberal government's corrupt green slush fund is loaded with conflict of interest. It hasn't changed, because it's still being administered by a board using exactly the same model, and the NRC can't answer questions about basic conflict of interest issues that are ongoing.

The constant theme we have at this public accounts committee on various issues is that when things go wrong, the ministers apparently have nothing to do with it. They always want to describe themselves—and Liberal members want to describe them—as mere passengers on the ship of state. I'm sorry to see that in the industry file, we have yet another Liberal minister who seems to be more focused on leadership campaign preparations than on governing.

I want to ask about something specific. Minister Champagne has said, as Mr. Brock mentioned, that there would be enhanced monitoring during the interim period and there would be changes to contribution agreements. When the minister said that, was he telling the truth?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I think the previous testimony here about the interim period, the monitoring, the review of the files, and acceptance of the AG's observations by the department and by SDTC is important. It's on the record to establish how things will proceed.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Can you please answer the question? Was the minister—whom you report to as well, ultimately—telling the truth when he said they were putting in place changes to contribution agreements and enhanced monitoring? Was Minister Champagne telling the truth, yes or no?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, the minister's actions are there on the record in terms of suspension of funding, putting in place a new interim board and having a process to review the recommendations that have been made, particularly in the Auditor General's report, and taking appropriate action on that, and then subsequently having it transferred—

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I'm running out of time, so I'll stop you there.

I asked you the question twice, and you can't tell me clearly that the minister whom you report to was telling the truth, which suggests he wasn't. Hopefully we'll have him before this committee so he can answer that directly, because he made some claims about changes at SDTC that just don't seem to have actually been made at all.

I want to ask about bonuses. Have bonuses been paid to executives, directors and managers who have been working on this green slush fund? Are people who are working on this receiving bonuses?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I'm not in a position to address bonuses of SDTC or its employees. I think those questions have to be addressed to the organization itself so that it can provide an answer for the members.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay.

You're supposed to be taking over the administration of it, so should those bonuses be paid? Will you recommend that they not be paid? What's your position on that going forward?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I think the employment of SDTC employees is subject to their arrangements with the foundation. At the point in time when they become NRC employees, they will fall under our regime for compensation. That's a completely separate employer, and obviously we'll account for what we're doing with those employees once they join our organization.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Should they receive bonuses, though?

[Mitch Davies]

Mr. Chair, I have no views to share with the committee in terms of the work of SDTC employees and bonuses. That's something you should address with the organization itself.