Public Accounts Committee on Sept. 25th, 2024

[Lysane Bolduc]

If I may, there are investigations under way, and I think that it would be wise to let those investigations conclude.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

In your testimony, you mentioned that you are there for your employees. How are you there for your employees, and were they involved in any way?

[Lysane Bolduc]

Thank you for the question.

Are you referring to other employees?

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

You mentioned earlier—

[Lysane Bolduc]

In general, when something out of the ordinary occurs—and this would qualify as something out of the ordinary—I do step up and support my senior directors, as well as my managers, through those occurrences.

Managers have a lot on their shoulders, generally speaking. They're not aware of every single rule and policy and so on and so forth. They deal with the day-to-day. They deal with the employees on a day-to-day.... My view is that we—management, executives—should be there for them when necessary.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Did you want to finish your comments? You were in the middle of talking about the new position of the quality review—

[Lysane Bolduc]

Yes, I can speak to that.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

You said there were 266 files reviewed. Perhaps you'd like to finish.

[Lysane Bolduc]

Thank you very much.

This is part of the new measures that are being implemented as part of a large modernization of procurement in general, but in particular, this will be beneficial to the specific commodity area that is the procurement of professional services.

As part of the procurement branch that I belong to, there is a new position. It's chief, contract quality and records compliance office. The office is called the contract quality and records compliance office. They were set up early in the fiscal year. Several executives within the procurement branch have already contributed to reviewing, from memory, 266 files under this new regime for compliance in terms of record-keeping.

Again, we've heard from various audits and reports, and through committee work as well, that there are gaps in documentation, so the department is taking action to remedy this.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Is there anything else that you would change or recommend?

[Lysane Bolduc]

In general, in terms of procurement, I think there's a lot of work that's under way. I'm actually pleased to be part of the modernization of the procurement of professional services and, of course, of the department. We public servants always strive to do better.

We, again, take to heart recommendations that are made from audits and reviews, so we're implementing changes in addition to what we see in our own world that requires modifications. There's already been a number of changes over the last couple of years, even before these committees and even before there were reviews and audits.

For instance, the electronic application, the electronic procurement system that was implemented, the interface with outside vendors is now CanadaBuys, and it is an easier application to use from outside, from external.... This is just one of the areas that, within ourselves and within the work that we do every day, we identify as needing modification, and action has been taken in that respect. We will continue to strive to make modifications that improve procurement processes within the department.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you. That is the time.

Ms. Yip, thank you.

I'd also like to thank Ms. Bolduc and Mr. von Schoenberg for their testimony, participation and patience tonight in relation to the study of “Report 1: ArriveCAN”.

You may submit additional information to the clerk. Please consult her if you have any questions.

You are now excused. We appreciate your time.

I'm just going to suspend for three minutes, and then we'll come back here and get to our business at hand, dealing with the budgets. I anticipate that it could take a few minutes, but it will be up to members to make that determination.

I'll suspend for about three minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I will bring the meeting back to order.

When we last left one another, we were going over the budgets the committee needs to adopt. You have copies of these.

This is for a supplementary budget for report 6 on SDTC. The additional funding being requested is $23,250. That will bring our total budget, with what's already been approved, to $25,250.

This is largely for travel that is linked to the witnesses, as passed by a motion by this committee. For example, as you know, if we don't use the resources, the funds, they get returned to the central budget. Already that is the case with one witness who appeared last week.

Ms. Yip, I will turn to you when—

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

I just wanted to make sure you saw me.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Yes. I appreciate it.

Already we've had one witness who was on the west coast appear virtually. This is a global budget that the clerk has put together to reflect some of the locations of the witnesses this committee has requested to appear before committee. At our last meeting, one of our members asked how much of our current budget has been spent. At this time, we have spent $1,322. This cost includes catering and headsets.

There we are.

Ms. Yip, you have the floor to discuss this budget.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

I actually want to move the motion that I put on notice before the break.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

This will require a vote to exit us from the budget to go to the....

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

She's moving to adjourn consideration of the budget. Is that what she's...?

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

No.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

She's moving to put it aside anyway. I think she wants to deal with the motion. I'm just going to consult with the clerk here on how to proceed so that we do this properly, but it will require a vote.

Go ahead, Ms. Yip.

[Jean Yip, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

We'll deal with the budget and then we'll move to the motion. Is that okay?

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Yes.

To go back to the budget, did anyone want to speak on the budget?

Go ahead, Mr. Drouin.

[Francis Drouin, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Because we are dealing with taxpayers' dollars and we are actually looking at how dollars were spent, I'm just wondering: On the budget that we will be approving tonight for SDTC at $23,250, are we expecting more expenses coming out of this particular study, or is this the set amount that we have budgeted for, understanding that there have been many meetings on this at other committees?

I see my esteemed chair from OGGO, who also has had a chance to look at this previously. I'm just trying to determine whether this is the budget for SDTC or we are expecting more dollars to be spent. I will ask the same question on ArriveCAN shortly, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

As it stands now, based on the witnesses this committee has passed a motion to hear from, this relates to them. Should the committee come back and say it wants to hear additional witnesses, I would be forced to come back with an additional budget. I think that answers your question.