I would agree with you, considering that this year we will spend as much on debt as we will on health care transfers and spend double as much on interest debt as we do on our DND. I think the difference between what your analysis shows and what CRA shows, from the CRA numbers, is almost the equivalent of what we actually spent on our defence department. I hope CRA is watching, or I hope the government is watching. We can follow up on the analysis that you have put forward.
Thanks very much, colleagues.
I'm going to read a motion into the record. I'm not looking to debate it today, but I want to table it today. It's from November 17. It reads:
That, given the fact that,
GC Strategies, a two-person company, that does not perform any actual work but exclusively subcontracts contracts they acquire, has received $59 million in taxpayer dollars from 2017 to present; and
despite government promises to reduce outside contract spending the recently released supplementary estimates...show an increase in contract and services spending of $1.2 billion
That the committee initiate a six-meeting investigation concerning the value for money the Government has obtained through contracting GC Strategies and that the committee report its findings and recommendations to the House.
To facilitate its investigation, pursuant to Standing Order 108(1), the committee order the production of all contracts between GC Strategies and the Government of Canada from 2017 to 2022 in an unredacted format.
The witness list include the following:
1. All GC Strategies employees...[all two of them]
2. All federal departments and agencies that hired GC Strategies from 2017 to present:
[DND]
...Employment, Workforce Development and Disability...
...Innovation Science and Industry
Courts Administration Service
Treasury Board...
Department of Families, Children and Social Development
Global Affairs...
—GC Strategies is very busy, evidently—
Canada Border Services Agency
[DFO]...
...Secretary of the Governor General
—maybe that's for the $8 million barn—
Department of Natural Resources
Department of Agriculture...
...Nuclear Safety Commission
...Public Safety Canada
...Transport Canada
...Environment...
[PSPC]
Additionally, the Ministers of the aforementioned departments and agencies are invited to appear alongside their departmental contracting agencies.