Mr. Chair, I think it's useful to note that when the decision was made in 2018 to go with a construction manager, that followed two really salient points.
One is that a special examination by the Office of the Auditor General in 2017 concluded that we had a serious deferred-maintenance problem. That meant we didn't have sufficient funds to look after the assets for which we had responsibility. As a result, we were given an additional $55 million in 2018 as part of our 2018 budget. Having determined how best to execute those additional funds and what model of construction should be considered, we decided to go with a construction management contract. It was deemed to be ultimately more cost-effective and lower-risk because ultimately we wouldn't have to hire many of the people we would otherwise have to hire under a general contracting model. That was important.
Second, it is important to note that the construction management contract itself was the subject of a public tender. The NCC went out in 2018 in an open, transparent and public way and asked companies that acted as construction managers to bid to be the construction manager for the NCC. It was competitively tendered. Pomerleau won. The model for construction management is very commonly used. It's being used for the parliamentary precinct project that's currently under way, which I'm sure committee members are aware of.
Then what happens is that the construction manager takes responsibility for tendering its own public bids to get subcontractors. Competition is ensured both in the selection of the construction manager and in the selection of subcontractors.
I hope that answers the question.