Public Accounts Committee on April 22nd, 2026

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

We're back.

I would ask members to take their seats. I know discussions in the hallway can be beneficial, but I also know that, sometimes, you have to hash these things out in public at the committee.

Mr. Lemire, do you have any comments or would you like me to give a government member the floor now?

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

First, I feel like I'm at a bit of an impasse right now in that I think a good-faith exchange is taking place, all things considered, but I'm still having a hard time grasping the scope of the workload being requested. If we're talking about a million documents, which I'll take on trust, we still need to talk about how to streamline certain aspects, such as those related to correspondence or email. To me, those things are essential. We have to be able to determine when people became aware of this, what potential solutions were considered and, above all, when measures were taken to address the shortcomings.

Of course, we're still talking about Cúram and the skyrocketing costs. The estimates turned out to be completely unrealistic. I'll recap the timeline: It started at $1.7 billion, then rose to about $2.4 billion, then to $3.5 billion, then I believe to $4.4 billion, and now it's at $6.6 billion or thereabouts. Costs jumped significantly four times. I believe this is a matter of public interest.

I'm also trying to understand how the contracts evolved. How were firms like Deloitte, Accenture and IBM able to secure these contracts? What mandates were they given? We've already received some information, and we need to dig deeper. Those companies were also the ones implementing the solutions.

Apparently, if a company makes mistakes, it is paid to correct them, and taxpayers have to foot the exorbitant bill. We also need to establish accountability, given that the Prime Minister of the day was notified by the Clerk of the Privy Council, Ms. Charette, in May.

Was there any other correspondence like that, which would have made the Prime Minister aware of how far off course things had gone? Were measures taken and made public? We haven't seen any.

These are important questions. At this point in time, based on the negotiations, I see nothing to suggest that a favourable amendment could be included in my motion.

This is not just about how the modernization program is being managed; it is also about the cost overruns and the new money they've asked for. It's also about how it was assessed under the circumstances.

I am open to clarifying the details of this motion a little. However, I think we need to understand the mistakes that were made so they will never be made again. That means we need to know what happened, obviously.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Osborne, go ahead, please.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I thank Mr. Lemire, as well, for the discussions we've had. We may still be at a stalemate. I'm hoping we can find a way to resolve this.

The challenge, Mr. Chair, is the amendment as it's written. It is absolutely 100%, without argument, impossible to fulfill that time frame under ATIP rules—the 30 days. We're literally talking about millions of documents and millions of dollars to produce those documents. We're trying to work with Mr. Lemire to find a way of getting a realistic ask that will provide him with the information he's looking for.

If the committee were to adopt this motion as it is, we will be putting forward something that I think we know will fail, which is not a realistic expectation for this committee.

If we can't resolve something, we should come back Monday and deal with this motion. Maybe we can continue to work with Mr. Lemire so that, in good faith, we can try to get him the information he's looking for. However, in good conscience, we know that if this motion passes on the floor, it cannot be fulfilled. Then it looks like the motion wasn't fulfilled, but we all know, in good conscience, that we cannot produce millions of documents in 30 days.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Go ahead, Mr. Bittle.

[Chris Bittle, Liberal, St. Catharines, ON]

If there's no one on the list, I'm happy to start talking. This wasn't on my bingo card today, but welcome to the committee....

It's unsurprising what we hear today and what I see, this motion that's before us. The Bloc comes down and pretends to care about the plight of seniors. Perhaps there's some genuine concern behind this, but instead of doing something meaningful, instead of doing something that will actually help those seniors, we're seeing a motion in which the Bloc is looking for millions of documents. They can pretend, “Oh, I'll find that needle in the haystack, don't you worry.” It's nonsense. It's pure nonsense what we're seeing here today.

The theory behind this—and my colleague Mr. Osborne talks about it—is that it's impossible to comply with this. That's what the Bloc is counting on. It's not to help seniors but to attempt to bring a contempt motion down the road. That's what they want. They want the dog-and-pony show of doing that, rather than actually finding what's wrong.

I expected a little better from Monsieur Lemire, but here we are with this in front of us. What do we expect, at the end of the day? Thirty days after this, Mr. Lemire will rise in the House and say, “Mr. Speaker, the government has failed to comply.”

I'm sure Mr. Lemire would be happy to make translators and interpreters suffer over millions of documents so he can find that needle in the haystack, that smoking gun. He knows that's not the case. He knows that what he's asking for is absolutely preposterous, but he still carries on. He says that everyone's negotiating in good faith, but at the same time, there's no genuine good faith in this document in front of us. All we see is an attempt to drag this out.

Millions of documents...I'm genuinely interested in hearing from the member how he's going to go through them. He and his assistant, who's sitting behind him, are going to go through document after document and they're going to find it, and they expect that the government.... I know the Government of Canada is big. It's a G7 country. However, at the end of the day, it's a lot to ask for millions of documents from any department.

What are we going to see? We're not going to see benefit. Are we going to see the benefit to seniors? No. If the government drops the truckload of boxes off at his office and says, “Here you go,” and complies with it, which we've said we can't.... This is what he's asking for: “Back up that 18-wheeler to my office. Dump off these documents. I'm going to go through them document by document.” It's going to take him years to go through it. In this hypothetical situation that he's created in which he genuinely thinks...that is, if he's genuine in this, which I don't know that he is.

What we're seeing is preposterous. If he gets this 18-wheeler at his office, and he's going through things page by page, how many years do we think it will take for him to get through this? We'll be multiple elections down the road before Monsieur Lemire says, “I found it. I found the smoking gun, this needle in the haystack.”

I'm hoping that he can be realistic. I'm hoping that the members of the committee can be realistic in terms of what they're looking at. I haven't been privy to these discussions. There's a genuine concern in the middle of this, but the solution that's been brought forward isn't meeting that.

Is he going to get an army of seniors in his riding to help him shovel through those documents, go page by page, make sure they're properly translated and ensure that he has that? This is just unbelievable. Well, it's not unbelievable. That's a stretch. It's fully believable, having been here long enough to see what we're going through. Where's the genuine desire to help those seniors?

I was sitting here while colleagues were discussing it. I heard some genuine interest to get to the bottom of this, but I don't know what those solutions are. I don't want to say them; they were said in confidence between the parties. The opposition members know they have the votes this week, and they're going to see what they can get: Get that vote. Be able to go to the Speaker, be able to rise on a question of privilege and say, “The government hasn't done the impossible thing that I asked them to do. Where's my 18-wheeler full of documents? I demand the 18-wheeler full of documents that will help Quebec seniors.” I doubt that.

I look to my colleagues. I don't want to hog it. I'm just a brief temporary member of this committee.

Mr. Chair, is there anyone else on the list?

Then I will cede my time. I hope we have some productive discussion going forward in the brief time that I'm here.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I'm sorry. I'm out of practice. I normally don't reveal the speaking list, but you caught me at a moment of weakness.

Mr. Lemire, you have the floor.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

How interesting. The only Liberal member who didn't take part in the negotiations is the one who's now lecturing me about intentions I didn't have. This is a far cry from good faith. Under the circumstances, all Quebeckers, especially seniors, are quite naturally wondering what the Liberals have to hide.

You know the procedure, Mr. Chair. A motion was moved. Obviously, when you make a request like that, you don't know how many documents it entails. If they tell me it could be a million documents, obviously, I'll act in good faith, and there will be discussions. There have been discussions with a number of government representatives over the past three days. However, I can't move an amendment to my own motion. That would have to come from the government, and no concrete solution has been put forward about what could be removed from this motion to make it realistic.

They're lecturing me again about how it's a million documents even though I've been open to the idea of excluding correspondence and emails, which might be too many documents to process in the time allotted. I thought we would be able to get other documents and hold committee meetings to ask those in charge about cost overruns amounting to billions of taxpayer dollars. That's what we're talking about.

The point is, they said it would be a million documents because of the correspondence and emails. I was open to the idea of leaving those out, and I was told that it would still be a million documents.

So who is lacking in good faith here? In my opinion, this shows that negotiating with the government and acting in good faith aren't productive.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much, Mr. Lemire.

Mr. Deltell, you have the floor.

[Gérard Deltell, Conservative, Louis-Saint-Laurent—Akiawenhrahk, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

The fact that Mr. Bittle is here tonight shows that this is a very important and sensitive topic for the government. We're honoured to welcome this parliamentary veteran, a man well versed in parliamentary strategies of all sorts, particularly in committee, where people can talk for hours without saying a thing. That's actually what we've seen in recent weeks during meetings of the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics, where the Minister of Finance was asked to testify about Alto, which was perfectly legitimate. However, there was systematic obstruction for nearly 20 hours. People kept talking about anything but the topic. What was the end result? Common sense won out, and the Minister of Finance will testify before the committee.

I think Mr. Lemire summed the situation up very well. No 18‑wheeler is going to show up in front of the constituency office of every member of this committee. Mr. Bittle knows full well that he was being dramatic. That's not realistic.

What is realistic is the constitutional duty our constituents entrusted to us almost a year ago. We have a duty to hold the government to account. That's why we have parliamentary committees and adopt motions to get to the bottom of things. Even if getting to the bottom of things leads to the production of hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, it is still our duty. It's not about the burden; it's about responsibility.

The issue of seniors is indeed essential. The management of public funds is even more so. We have a government that recently passed a budget with a deficit of almost $80 billion. That's money we do not have. We're passing that bill on to our children. We also know full well that the aging population means that the burden, the reality and the needs of seniors will impact all levels of government.

Mr. Lemire's motion will enable us to address this issue, so we support it because we want to get to the bottom of this.

So let's set aside the theatrics. I would like this motion to be adopted.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Mr. McKinnon, go ahead, please.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

If it's okay, I'd like to cede my time to Mr. Osborne.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

It doesn't quite work like that.

I have a list here so we'll get to Mr. Osborne soon.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

I'll—

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I can remove you and put you back on the bottom of the list if you like.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

No, that's okay.

First of all, our colleague is here because Professor Derksen wasn't, not because it indicates any ulterior motive of the government.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Chair, there is no French interpretation at the moment.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Lemire mentioned that we want to toe the line and keep costs in order and so forth, and we don't want to waste taxpayer money. That's exactly the point of what we're trying to negotiate with Mr. Lemire. We're trying to keep the number of documents to a manageable level and to a time frame that is reasonable and responsible.

In that respect, I'd like to submit an amendment. In the second paragraph of this motion in English, I'd like to change the word “management” where it says “relating to the management of the Modernization of Benefit Payments”, to say, “estimates and costs”. That would be my amendment at this point.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

I have an amendment on the floor to change the word “management” in paragraph two to “estimates and costs”.

In French, the word “gestion” would be replaced by “prévisions et coûts”.

Thank you very much, Mr. Deltell.

We are now debating the amendment to the motion.

Are there any speakers?

Mr. Lemire, you have the floor.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I would like some clarification.

Do the estimates and costs reflect every cost increase? The initial estimate was for $1.7 billion. Of course, that went up to $2.4 billion and then to $3.5 billion and then to $4.4 billion, which is what the Auditor General's report was based on. Then there was another request for a new cost estimate.

Does this include all of those stages? The idea is to find out how much management costs have gone up since 2017 and to understand what happened at each of those stages. Essentially, if their costs doubled, tripled, quadrupled or quintupled the bill, it seems to me that is because they were unable to deliver the program, to put it politely.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Does anyone want to reply to Mr. Lemire?

I can’t.

Go ahead, Mr. Osborne.

[Tom Osborne, Liberal, Cape Spear, NL]

Again, I'm hoping to lower the temperature in the room because, at the end of the day, we want to deal with this motion and the amendments.

I'll just speak to this. It is a good-faith amendment. I would suggest to Mr. Lemire—and all members of the committee—that we are trying to get him the information he's looking for, but we're trying to do it in a way so that he's not buried in millions of documents.

I would urge all members of the committee to vote for this amendment. It's not meant to distract from what he's trying to accomplish but rather to help him achieve what he's trying to accomplish.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

My question is specific, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Would you like to go first? It was kind of a tie, Mr. McKinnon, unless you want to hear from Mr. Lemire first. It's up to you.

You have the floor.

Then, I will give the floor to Mr. Lemire.

[Ron McKinnon, Liberal, Coquitlam—Port Coquitlam, BC]

I just want to emphasize that the point here is to keep this to a manageable request and a doable thing. Mr. Lemire mentioned his concern about wasting taxpayer money. If we issue a request for these documents—a massive data dump—it could cost millions of dollars. It could take weeks and weeks.

I want to keep this reasonable and manageable. This is, as Mr. Osborne mentioned, a good-faith attempt to do so.