Evidence of meeting #69 for Veterans Affairs in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was competition.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
I'm not nice because I'm interrupting you again, Mr. Chupin. However, your answers to my questions are perfect.
There are 500 competitions in the Canadian Competitions Catalogue. Has the government ever previously disregarded a jury's decision and arbitrarily decided the winner?
Full Professor, Université de Montréal, Canada Research Chair in Architecture, Competitions and Mediations of Excellence
No jury decision has ever been replaced in response to the result of an opinion poll. Moreover, as far as I know, it hasn't happened anywhere in the world. Obviously, I may be mistaken, but—
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
It has never happened anywhere else in the world.
Thank you very much.
Full Professor, Université de Montréal, Canada Research Chair in Architecture, Competitions and Mediations of Excellence
That's it.
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Thank you very much.
Mr. Le Moine, you say that the government simply had no right to award the contract to a team other than Team Daoust.
Exactly what do you mean by that? What right are you referring to?
Lawyer, As an Individual
I'm simply alluding to the competition rules which I discussed earlier. The departments concerned were supposed to receive the jury's recommendation and, normally, to endorse it and ensure that the contract was awarded to the winner. There was indeed another possibility, which is the case with any requests for proposals and under competition rules, and that is to cancel the competition.
It's obviously impossible to cancel a competition in all circumstances. It has to be done in a manner that's fair for all bidders. There are rules regarding cancellation. Competitions are rarely cancelled, but it's possible to do so.
However, there was no provision for awarding the contract to someone else, which runs contrary to the entire practice in public art and architecture, as the experts testified earlier.
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Do you think there have been any precedents in Canada that are slightly similar to this situation?
Lawyer, As an Individual
There's very little case law on competitions. There is a kind of consensus on method, but there has been very little debate on that.
However, there's a great deal of case law on requests for proposals, but that's another matter.
The competition system is well established and, in general, infrequently challenged.
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
What do you think are the potential legal consequences of an arbitrary decision such as the one the government has just made?
Lawyer, As an Individual
Once again, I'm thinking of architecture and public art. The consequences are that the practice will discourage people from submitting bids or sitting on a jury.
It's all well and good to sit on a jury, but what happens then? People will work for a year, but the proposal may well be set aside. In addition, will the best architects and artists submit their entries?
It's relatively complex from a legal standpoint, given that there's little case law. I don't think we have the time to go into that issue in detail today.
Bloc
Luc Desilets Bloc Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC
Ms. Lord, earlier you said you had been involved in 75 public art competitions and had never seen a jury decision overturned.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Emmanuel Dubourg
Thank you, Ms. Lord, Mr. Desilets and Mr. Le Moine.
Mr. Boulerice, you now have the floor for six minutes.
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks to all the witnesses for being here.
Ms. Daoust and Mr. Fortin, I want to tell you from the outset that I'm sorry for everything that has happened to you. I think you've been treated absolutely unfairly by the Department of Canadian Heritage and by the federal government. My apology will serve no purpose because I wasn't involved in the decision, but I frankly have to say I find it appalling on the part of a great country and an advanced democracy such as Canada
Mr. Le Moine, I'm going to ask you a question. If we were on Tout le monde en parle, this would probably be the killer question. Mr. Desilets started talking about it, but I'm going to go a little further and use stronger language: you said that the ministers didn't have the authority to override the jury's decision. And yet they did.
Is that an illegal act?
Lawyer, As an Individual
Quite sincerely, since there's a lot of case law on competitions, it would be hard for me to cite you in actual decision.
However, at the very least, norms and processes are important in a democracy. The rule of law requires that both the governing and the governed abide by preestablished rules under which actors may act knowing what awaits them.
Clearly in this instance, the rules were changed along the way or, at the very least, that's the impression we get. Perhaps the competition could still be redone, but it appears, in the present circumstances, that the most elegant solution for all parties would be to reverse the decision that was made.
NDP
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
I see. Thank you.
Mr. Chupin, you said a little earlier in that it was particularly important to publish the jury's report and that you didn't understand why it hadn't already been done.
Please explain to us ignorant people why you think it's so important to publish that report.
Full Professor, Université de Montréal, Canada Research Chair in Architecture, Competitions and Mediations of Excellence
It's like a court decision.
Following the process, all Canadians must be able to understand why a jury, which operated independently and, normally, discreetly, made its decision. We're talking about a public competition here.
A report exists. I'm sure it exists. We also tried to obtain it and were told that we would only get it in several months, or even a year. In short, it's being postponed.
This document exists, and it explains exactly how the judgment was made, a qualitative judgment on a complex subject. It exists and it must be made public.
NDP
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
We can see the lack of transparency in the entire process, which seems to have gone all wrong since you received the letter on June 19.
Ms. Daoust and Mr. Fortin, I'm quite honestly unfamiliar with this kind of competition. So that people and the members of this committee have a clear understanding of the situation, what kind of investment of time, energy and resources does the development and submission of a competition project represent?
Founding Partner, Architect, Urbanist, Team Daoust
It represents a lot of energy, particularly in this case because it took one year to develop the proposal. It was done in two stages. First, we had to submit our application. The government selected five candidates and asked all five to prepare a whole series of quite exhaustive documents. We had to prepare drawings, presentation texts, and animation and many other elements. That necessarily takes time and energy, and the competition lasted nearly one year.
Then we were asked to make a presentation. So we made our presentation to the jury, and that was done virtually because of the pandemic. You should know that these competitions are judged solely by a jury, but we always prepare a technical report on our proposal. The technical committee called us back to request details of our proposal for the monument. So we had to work on that as well. Then we submitted the whole entry.
So it requires a great deal of effort. These are obviously projects that we consider interesting and prestigious, but they require a great deal of energy from the team. We are just two representatives here today, but we have a large multidisciplinary committee that includes urban planning designers, architects, landscape architects, artists, advisers, cost experts and so on. It involves major teamwork.
Artist and Architect, Team Daoust
I would like to add that the mere fact that our application was accepted was due to the sum of all the work we did in advance. After seeing our proposal accepted and winning the competition, it was quite disappointing not to be able to enjoy the knock‑on effect that can have on a career.
As we said at the outset, we want to recover the commission, but we also want to ensure, for our peers, that this doesn't happen again. Our society can't afford to impoverish itself culturally because high-quality candidates refuse to enter competitions for lack of trust.
NDP
Alexandre Boulerice NDP Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
Would you be tempted to enter this kind of competition today?
Founding Partner, Architect, Urbanist, Team Daoust
If the government maintains the position that it isn't required to abide by its own ground rules, I would say no. It takes too much of a team's energy to do so. In addition, if we had clearly been told that the outcome of the competition would be based on a survey, we wouldn't have entered it. This work has to be judged by experts. It's really that kind of work.