Evidence of meeting #156 for Public Accounts in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was edc.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Your memory, obviously, is shaky at the moment. Provide it to us in writing, please.
Did you advise—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Williamson
Wait one second, Mr. McCauley.
Could you provide those names to us in the next couple of weeks? Mr. McCauley has asked for that information four times. The committee will look for that.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Export Development Canada
I would be happy to do so.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative John Williamson
Mr. McCauley, you have the floor for three and a half minutes.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Thanks.
You mentioned earlier that you advised Finance that you did not have the capacity and would have to seek outside resources, which ended up being Accenture.
Did you advise Finance you would be using Accenture specifically, or just that you would be contracting it out?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Export Development Canada
We advised that we would be contracting it out and that it would be a single source, not an RFP.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
You knew already that you were going to sole-source it to Accenture.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Export Development Canada
We knew already that we needed to move very quickly to put these funds in the hands of small businesses.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Ma'am, if I ask a simple yes-or-no question, could you provide a simple yes-or-no answer? I think Canadians and parliamentarians deserve that.
Did you already know Accenture would be the recipient of the sole-source contract? It's a yes-or-no answer.
December 4th, 2024 / 5:15 p.m.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Thank you. That's not so tough, is it?
Mr. Winterhalt, in your response to some of the mess of the sole-sourcing with Accenture, the comment was that you're updating your procurement policies in light of the audit. I have to ask you. You sole-sourced to Accenture and allowed a shark of a consulting company to sole-source a contract to themselves, dictating to Canadians how much taxpayers were going to pay and for what services.
Why do you need an audit like this to set up procurement practices that don't turn over the taxpayers' bank to a company like Accenture? How is it not part of your regular daily procurement process? Do you need to have an audit to tell you not to give a wad of cash, sole-sourced, to a company and let them sole-source other work to themselves, dictating to taxpayers how much they are going to charge us?
Todd Winterhalt Senior Vice-President, International Markets and Head of Communications and Public Affairs, Export Development Canada
I'll ask Mr. Moore to speak about our procurement practices and provide some clarity.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
It doesn't sound like you actually have a procurement practice.
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
We do. We have a strong preference for doing RFPs. We only accept—
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Let me stop you right there.
You don't have a practice or a rule to get competitive bids. You just have a preference.
Were you aware that Accenture was going to sole-source and choose themselves for that contract for the added work?
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
The contract you're referring to, for the loan accounting system, was a very complicated implementation. When we went ahead with the—
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
I asked you a question. I would ask you to respect that.
Were you aware that Accenture was going to grant the secondary contract, noted by the Auditor General, to themselves?
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
EDC granted the contract. Accenture ran a market scan and identified 24 companies.
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Were you aware that Accenture identified themselves as the people to give the money to?
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
Accenture identified 24 options. There was one Canadian option, one European option and one Brazilian option. We were quite disappointed when the Canadian option pulled out of the process. We had a European option. We had a Brazilian—
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Were you aware that Accenture was sole-sourcing a contract to itself?
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
We were aware that one of the options had recently been acquired by Accenture, yes. We did our analysis and—
Conservative
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Did it not set off alarm bells?
Honestly, I'm trying to grasp this. In what world would you not be setting your hair on fire over Accenture taking taxpayers' money and saying, “We're going to hire ourselves for this other work, but don't worry. We'll let you know what the fair price is that we're going to charge ourselves to charge the taxpayers.”
How could this have happened?
Executive Vice-President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Export Development Canada
EDC made the final decision to go with the option that was presented to us. It was the lower-cost and lower-execution risk among the choices that were available to us for getting a loan accounting system built and ready in six months. That was the timing we had at that time.