Debates of Oct. 4th, 1994

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-52, an act to establish the Department of Public Works and Government Services and to amend and repeal certain acts, be read the second time and referred to a committee; and of the amendment.

Department Of Public Works And Government Services Act

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Charlevoix, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for allowing me to finish my speech on Bill C-52.

As I was saying before question period, it has cost the government $5 billion to contract out in 1992-93. This money that the government of Canada spent on contracting-out could have been used to improve the services provided to the Canadian public instead of maintaining a patronage relationship with the friends of the regime.

Let me tell you that between 1984-85 and 1992-93, costs have gone up with contracting-out. Costs have increased by 56 per cent at Public Works Canada during the same nine-year period. They increased by 114.2 per cent at DND and by 207 per cent at Health and Welfare Canada. Costs also increased at Supply and Services Canada-by 247 per cent. And, to really cap it, they increased by 628 per cent at Customs and Excise.

In ten years, while under pressure by the Auditor General and the House of Commons Standing Committee on Public Accounts to do so, the federal government never managed to demonstrate that contracting-out was cost-effective. The Department of Public Works and Government Services is a major department. It handles a great deal of money. Let me give you a few examples.

Public Works and Government Services Canada is responsible for the inflow and outflow of all public funds and keeps an average daily cash balance of $2.3 million. It is also responsible for the accounting system and makes financial transactions totalling $163 million. It makes payments to the tune of $200 million annually for the Canada Pension Plan, the old age security system, taxes on goods and services, Public Service employees' pay, and so on.

It is also responsible for federal purchases. Last year, $13 billion-worth of goods and services falling into 17,000 different classes were purchased. It negotiates 175,000 contracts every year. It is the custodian of federal real property. It owns property valued at $6.5 billion. It provides office space to approximately 170,000 employees, in 4,000 different locations. It spends $2 billion a year.

How can we ensure that the government will not use contracting-out or privatization contracts to reward its friends? In other words, how can we avoid any kind of patronage in the awarding of privatization or other contracts by the federal government?

Bill C-52 should have more teeth. This is the Bloc Quebecois's proposal: We ask that a public review board be created under the bill to scrutinize contracts awarded by the Department of Public Works and Government Services and to ensure openness.

Second, we ask that a contracting-out code be clearly defined in this bill.

Third, we demand that members of Parliament of all political stripes be consulted about and kept informed of the government contract awarding process involving the ridings they represent.

Fourth and last proposal: We ask that the Department of Public Works and Government Services produce regular statements-monthly reports-to open up the federal government contracting process. The problem with this bill is that members of Parliament cannot find out which government contracts directly affect their ridings. There is no way to make federal officials accountable for contract-generated or in-house expenditures-to make them denounce any waste of public funds.

This bill should also provide for elimination of advance payments such as those we discovered recently at Communications Canada.

This bill must also protect the government because it left the door wide open to lobbyists. It does not allow a sufficient degree of openness. Not too long ago in this House, the hon. member for Richelieu moved a motion to prevent companies, stakeholders and lobbyists from contributing to the government's election fund. Unfortunately, this motion was rejected by the Liberal government and by many Reform members.

I think that lobbyists who occasionally attend $1,000-a-head dinners given by the Prime Minister have a right to expect the government to pay them back.

For all these reasons, the Bloc Quebecois proposes setting up a three-party public review board whose elected members would come from all political parties represented in and officially recognized by the House of Commons, from public administration experts and from Auditor General officials. The government should use this bill to give itself additional audit authority.

These are certainly the most important openness criteria the government should set for itself.

[Ronald J. Duhamel, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Public Works and Government Services]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague talked about sub-contracting and reported on some abuses that he saw in the last government. That is exactly one of the reasons why Canadians throughout the country decided to throw the former government out.

It is also because of the concerns we have that we-my colleague and I and other hon. members-are reviewing the issue of contracting out, to ensure that it is fair, equitable and open.

I have a very important question to ask the hon. member. He talks about openness, fairness, balance, etc. I wonder if he knows that the Minister of Public Works and Government Services invited all members of this House to subscribe to the open bidding service and to the publication on government procurement? The reason I ask this question is that he could find the answers to many if not all the questions he raised if he subscribed to those services which are provided by the minister.

Now, if I am right, and I just checked, so I think that I am probably right, no member of the Bloc has subscribed to this service. I did not check for yesterday and today, but as of last Friday. When my colleague talks about honesty, openness and fairness, why did he not subscribe to these services offered by the minister so that he can see for himself whether or not we have been fair? Why did he not do it or why did some of his colleagues not accept this service? Openness, fairness and honesty are there.

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Charlevoix, QC]

Mr. Speaker, yes, I went through the process with the department in question to be able to subscribe to the service which the member, Mr. Duhamel, mentioned. They told me that it would cost $500 a year to have access to that information. Also, something which the member did not say is that-

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

It is probably simply an oversight but I just want us to remember that we cannot name one another in this House; we must refer to other members by their titles or the constituencies they represent.

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Charlevoix, QC]

The member for St. Boniface mentioned that we can always go to the library or the public information service, but it is a real maze, even for members of Parliament. My colleague, the member for Québec-Est, and I will soon subscribe.

But on the subject of openness, the member should understand that if the minister cannot promise to accept the lowest bidder who meets the conditions, it is a little less open; it becomes rather vague.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Hamilton—Wentworth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the English translation of my colleague's remarks in which he was saying that MPs should be consulted and informed on the awarding of government contracts in their ridings. I trust that was a correct translation.

I have no difficulty with the idea of being informed. However, if it is a matter of consultation, does the member opposite not see a danger that it will be perceived that politicians, MPs, are interfering with what should be an open process and putting political weight on what should be a completely non-partisan question?

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Charlevoix, QC]

Mr. Speaker, very recently at a meeting of the government operations committee, a government member told the committee about an experience he just had in his riding.

He had not been warned by the minister or any official, but fortunately, since he cares about his riding, he read a public notice from the department saying that the government was looking for a place to relocate the post office in his riding. The member intervened with the department and helped save a million dollars in this transaction.

[Ian McClelland, Reform, Edmonton Southwest, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I I draw to the attention of the hon. member, to continue with the question of my colleague opposite, that the very thought of members of Parliament being advised of or being part of a

bidding process is exactly the wrong direction. It is everything that could possibly be wrong with politics in my view.

We have no business being part of what is going on in the bidding process or anything of that nature concerning the spending of public money in our ridings. If we were in different ridings it might be a different situation, but in our own ridings it is something we should not be touching with a 10-foot pole, in my estimation.

Another point I raise with my colleagues is that of always going to the lowest bidder. It is normal business practice to be very careful to make the best purchase, which is not always the lowest bidder. I suspect there has to be some flexibility, because in business practice and experience I am familiar with price is an important factor but not the only factor in awarding a contract. Could I be favoured with a response from the member.

[Gérard Asselin, Bloc, Charlevoix, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the question is twofold. First, I said that it should be standard procedure for a member to be informed of the goods or services which may be provided under a government contract or by contracting out, in his or her riding.

Members of this House are consulted; they have to vote and participate in the proceedings. When we are working in our ridings it is our duty to make representations. It is not a question of sticking our noses in the government's affairs, but we should at least be made aware of what is going on in our ridings.

Secondly, we discussed the issue of the lowest valid bid. What needed to be included should have been clearly mentioned in the specifications. If that was done in the first place and a bid is found to be valid, it is valid based on those specifications. Then, to accept the lowest valid bid is, in my opinion, to properly manage public money.

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph—Wellington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, given the government's strong commitment to improving the efficiency of government operations and to deficit control and reduction, the amalgamation of common services embodied in Bill C-52 makes eminent sense to me.

It has been clearly demonstrated that one of the primary causes of waste and confusion is the unnecessary duplication of services and functions both within the government and between levels of government.

In these times we simply cannot afford to have human and financial resources diverted to performing tasks throughout many departments and agencies of government when such tasks can be more effectively and much more cost effectively handled through a central agency.

This is the primary rationale behind the creation of the new Department of Public Works and Government Services Canada. Although it is just about a year since the amalgamation began, a number of efficiencies and savings have already become apparent. There will undoubtedly be many more such savings in the years ahead as the benefits of this integrated approach take full force.

Public Works and Government Services Canada provide common services to more than 150 federal departments, agencies and crown corporations. It provides them with a wide range of services to meet their needs, including property management, communications, printing and publishing, translation, architectural and engineering services.

It also looks after the issuing of all Government of Canada payments and undertakes billions of dollars worth of procurement on behalf of its clients each and every year. In short, Public Works and Government Services Canada is there to look after thousands of administrative transactions daily on behalf of its clients so that individual departments can focus all their time and energies on their own programs and priorities. To me this is a very good thing.

The amalgamation of the four founding elements of the new department, that is the former departments of Public Works Canada and Supply and Services Canada, as well as the government telecommunications agency and the translation bureau, has already paved the way for efficiencies of operation. For example, the corporate services areas of the individual components are being integrated. Corporate services encompass such central functions as finance, administration, corporate planning, contract claims resolutions and security, among other areas.

When taking into consideration the operational reviews that have been carried out and the recommendations, as well as the new systems to be implemented and the amalgamation, these initiatives will result in the savings of expenditures totalling $180 million over five years from the date of amalgamation. This sounds good to me.

Regional operations have also been integrated and the total number of regional offices reduced from 10 to 6, again another cost cutting service. This has been achieved with no less service to client departments or, most important, to the general public. Clearly the new integrated Department of Public Works and Government Services has already demonstrated that it can provide a more comprehensive service to the government and, more important, at a considerable cost saving to the taxpayer.

While the efficiencies that Public Works and Government Services can effect within its own organization are substantial, they represent only a small part of the story. By bringing together the experience and expertise of the component organizations we are creating within the department a centre of expertise more extensive and more skilled than we have ever had in the past.

This in turn will help create savings and efficiencies not only in the Department of Public Works and Government Services but through all government departments and all agencies.

The department will facilitate government-wide savings by providing re-engineered systems for use by all departments. Such sophisticated systems as electronic procurement and settlement, automated biowork station, a travel escort system and so forth will provide throughout the government streamlined processes, better ways of delivering services, rational resource allocation and more savings.

In its central position with close links to all departments and agencies, Public Works and Government Services can and will play a leading role in many government initiatives aimed at cost cutting and the reduction of duplication.

For example, the department is very actively involved in the government initiative known as locally shared support services. The basic idea of this initiative is to consolidate service and reduce costs by having departments and agencies located in the same building or complexes share certain physical support services. Again this is a very good idea, one-stop shopping for all.

These might include such functions as security, mail room or facility management. Individually, these arrangements may be quite small, but taken collectively over hundreds of federal installations all across Canada, they can add up to many millions of dollars in savings to Canadian taxpayers. Again, I would hope the House would see this is a very good thing and a very good idea, one worth our full support.

Public Works and Government Services has organized to support and encourage this initiative through its regional delivery network. It has identified two phases to implementing this scheme. In the first phase large departments, including Public Works and Government Services itself, will make use of their size, their regional representation and economies of scale. They will offer their services to smaller departments.

In the second phase re-engineering and integration of electronic services will be added. This phase will provide telecommunication and informatics infrastructure, office automation and video conferencing as well as total office support facilities similar to those in the private sector.

A number of these innovative initiatives are already being pilot tested during this current fiscal year. Certain economies have already been put into place across the country such as sharing of reception services and joint management of storerooms and warehouse facilities.

The point is that the creation of the Department of Public Works and Government Services through the amalgamation of most of the government common service agencies will not only help Public Works and Government Services to make substantial cost efficiencies within its own organization, it will also create a consolidated centre of expertise and leadership that can help scores of departments and agencies throughout the government introduce similar economies to their own operations.

This will add up to hundreds of millions of dollars in savings to Canadian taxpayers in the years ahead. This is reason enough for all of us in the House to support this legislation and to give speedy passage to Bill C-52.

[Michel Bellehumeur, Bloc, Berthier—Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. member who just spoke. As regards this bill, we are not opposed to the idea of trying to do more with less money. We do not oppose to that principle; on the contrary, the Bloc Quebecois favours such an approach by the government. However, this legislation is nothing more than a bunch of old sections from various acts which are put together to amalgamate old departments into a single one, under a new name. Can the hon. member tell us just what is new in this bill? Can she tell us if there is anything new to give more transparency to that department which, in the old days, was known as the patronage department? Is there anything new in this bill to promote that transparency which we have heard so much about since the beginning of the 35th Parliament?

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph—Wellington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is no question the government is committed to open, fair and transparent access to the procurement process. That is why the Minister of Public Works and Government Services offered to all members an invitation to join in the open bidding process in the government business opportunities publication.

With this system subscribers get instant access to contract opportunities, notices of planned sole source contracts and notices of contract awards. It also offers contract histories which are information on contracts that have been awarded in the past, to whom and for what amount.

I would respectfully say that you cannot get much more open than this.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the member that $180 million after five years is certainly the direction the government should be going. However I happen to note that is against a $2.3 billion per year budget.

I did some quick mathematics. I believe we are talking about an 8 per cent reduction after a full five-year period. Does the member not think there is a little bit more in the system that can be squeezed out than taking five years to get only an 8 per cent reduction in the budget?

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph—Wellington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is quite right. If that was all we were going to save, then perhaps he would be right about 8 per cent. But I would totally disagree that it is all that is going to be saved.

Quite realistically we are talking about a number of things here. We are talking about an integrated approach. We are talking about a one-stop shopping centre, so to speak, that will make it easier for our constituents, yours and mine. We are talking about same housing.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

I just want to remind all members, although it may not be critical in this debate today, but the best practice has been established and we try to remind one another to direct all remarks through the Speaker.

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph—Wellington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one major thing is the expertise that is going to be housed together and able to do things quite uniquely. Those are all benefits.

I remind the hon. member across the way that by the year 2005 we will save $1 billion. This is truly going to be a real cost saving initiative. It is also more than that. It is going to be a truly new initiative. It will plunge us into the next century.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Hamilton—Wentworth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to direct one remark to the member for Guelph-Wellington. The good news I heard in her remarks was that these changes will eliminate much of the duplication of services between the federal government and the provinces.

Would the member agree that this will eliminate one of the primary sources of friction between the federal government and the provinces, and that provinces like Alberta and Quebec, for example, should be very happy?

[Brenda Chamberlain, Liberal, Guelph—Wellington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I definitely think this is going to go a long way to address many of the concerns that provincial governments have raised with the federal government. I appreciate my colleague bringing that up.

[Ronald J. Duhamel, Liberal, St. Boniface, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I want to make a suggestion to you, Mr. Speaker. When the Bloc member spoke earlier, he said that the system set up by the minister cost $500 to each member of Parliament. Since that figure seemed very high, I went to check on it and I was told that the figure is only $37. Consequently, I-

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

Order, please. I am sorry but this is really not a point of order. It may be an issue to discuss and I am sure we can look at it later. Questions and comments. Debate. The hon. member for Kootenay East.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is always nice to be able to say something positive about the direction in which the government is going. In this instance I believe that it is going in the right direction in terms of consolidation, efficiency and savings.

In fairness to Canadians who have suffered loss of real income over the last five years and who may have been displaced or have had members in their families displaced-many Canadians have had to scramble to survive-there must be an understandable lack of sympathy. I can understand the lack of sympathy on the part of Canadians for systems within the government which are bloated and not efficient. However the government is going in the right direction.

I also believe that within any workforce, whether it is the civil service or any industry, that when people are not efficiently producing they know it. When people are working at jobs that are dead end jobs and can see that they should be redeployed that they have this, I will call it, a antsyness, a feeling of discomfort in their place of work.

In that place of work there is typically a lack of job satisfaction. Certainly there is a lack of a sense of security. I know I have been in situations from time to time in employment where it was obvious that the enterprise that I was in was going nowhere and that gives no sense of security. When we have a lack of direction from the top, a lack of statement of purpose and a lack of plan coming from the top, it exacerbates the situation.

Yesterday in the House I raised the example of Parks Canada. We have a situation in my constituency where members of the Yoho National Park-only 90 people work there-are in a real dilemma. They do not have any idea of what is going on. The top people in the parks department do not have any idea what is going on either.

All sorts of things are being proposed. For example, in clearing the highway which is the major project for the park in the winter, it is now proposed that the whole operation be moved to Lake Louise. What does that do to the businesses in Golden? What does it do in terms of the efficiency? It is also proposed that the head office be moved to Jasper. What does that mean? The picture I am trying to paint is the situation all over the map.

When we have a downsizing challenge, whether it has to do with the issues covered specifically by Bill C-52 or all of government, I submit that the government must be prepared to take one step. That one step must be specific, it must be incisive like a razor, but above all it must be part of a total plan.

With great respect to the Liberal frontbench, to this point I get no idea of an incisive, total plan. As a consequence the civil service right from the bottom to the top is saying: "When is the shoe going to drop? Is it going to be me? What is going to happen?"

I suspect that members from British Columbia are aware of the fact that they will be getting letters, that they will be getting petitions from people within the civil service. I cannot speak for the rest of Canada but I can say as far as British Columbia is concerned, many of us are receiving representations from the federal civil service saying: "What is going on? What is going to happen next?"

There is a tremendous feeling of insecurity. If I could do anything I would encourage the frontbench to get on with a total plan and more important, to communicate what that plan is once they have actually got it together. The current fear and anxiety within the federal civil service is leading naturally to a loss of productivity.

A couple of minutes ago, I raised the issue that there will be $180 million saved on a $2.3 billion budget after five years. I repeat that the government is going in the right direction but the problem is it is taking rather mincing steps.

I would like to read an excerpt from a speech given by the chairman of the board of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce on February 15 in Halifax. Considering that this person is responsible for countless billions of dollars in assets and has tens of thousands of employees in one of the major banks in Canada, he has a tremendous sense of the direction Canada is going. I suggest we listen rather carefully to this excerpt from his speech.

It is all too easy to think that debt is a government problem, but it is not. The debt does not cost governments; it costs Canadian taxpayers. Canadians pay for the debt directly every day in interest paid from taxes.

Before I carry on I want to underline the point that this is not the Reform Party speaking, although it sounds like it. This is the chairman of the board of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. He said:

The per capita annual interest charge is about $2,200 from tax revenues; $2,200 per Canadian goes to pay interest on accumulated debt. Before a single dollar of income is redistributed, before a dime goes to social programs, before a penny is spent on any other government program $2,200 must be paid yearly in interest for each and every person in Canada.

Are you listening? Remember, this amount-

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

Order, order. If I want to take every occasion you present me with I will try to react. In terms of speaking to one another, the word you or in French the word vous totally excludes the Speaker. I really love my work and I like to be included and wish I could sometimes be even more involved.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate your intervention. All of us are on a learning curve. I certainly am as one of the new people here and I appreciate your comment.

Remember the amount of $2,200 is needed from each one of us just to pay the interest on the debt. We are not even touching the principal. As a result, the cumulative debt of the federal and provincial levels of government is growing at a rate of $60 billion a year and the compounding continues. The pattern has persisted for years. Is calling this situation a fiscal cancer an overstatement? What would you call it?

And let us remember: Politicians did not do this. Governments did not do this. Civil servants did not do this. We prosperous, peaceful, common sense Canadians did this to ourselves.

Whatever the party or prime minister or finance minister, the Government of Canada has not had a single balanced budget in 20 years. During the same period there have been scores of budgets in the provinces. Relatively few provincial treasuries have forecast a balanced budget and only rarely have they achieved their targets.

Of course, we have had elections; 83 different occasions on which the people could exercise their democratic right to choose national and provincial governments. We had all those opportunities to change policy directions. We have elected Liberal, Progressive Conservative, New Democrat, Social Credit and Parti Quebecois governments. We have given them variously majority or minority mandates. We have even had from time to time intense national debates about debt and deficits, but our total debt has continued to soar even higher.

He talks about Canadians and says:

We have only ourselves to blame. Most experienced politicians, I would guess a solid majority in every cabinet in the country, will confess privately that there is no constituency for cutting spending. Canadians may be in favour of cutting somebody else's special interest spending but not their own. The result has been an endless procession of impossibly conflicting instructions to our political leadership: Cut spending, but not on this; save money, but not on that.

I like this guy. He goes on to say:

Pity our politicians. It would have taken the wisdom of Solomon and the patience of Job to respond to such a conflicting cry and neither of them had to get elected.

Government spending problems are too often oversimplified as being a question of inefficiency. Some say that the problem can be resolved by reducing spending in all current categories. That would help but it is only the beginning. The real problem is that many government programs are outdated and it is not just that we are spending too much, it is that we are spending on the wrong things.

The real problem in my judgment is that we as politicians have a responsibility to talk straight to our constituents. During the last election it perplexed me whenever the Reform Party would talk straight and say we must drive the deficit to zero in as quick a period of time as possible that we were attacked by the

Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives as being the slash and spend and hack and cut party.

The reality is that we in Canada are at the wall. We have managed to get away with this infrastructure spending, or should I say borrowing, this transfer of intergenerational debt to my grandchildren who I have never seen and are not even born and their descendants, all for the sake of some election sloganeering.

It is the responsibility of all politicians no matter what their stripe to generate a culture of acceptance to the fact that it is going to hurt. It is going to hurt me, it is going to hurt you, Mr. Speaker, and it is going to hurt the people who are listening to this debate or reading it in Hansard . It is going to hurt. We fundamentally have a choice of doing it to ourselves under our control, or letting some external force do it to us.

Today the finance minister stood in this place and very forcefully and very eloquently said: "We will maintain control". How can you maintain control when you continue to spend $110 million a day more than you have coming in? It is impossible. You cannot maintain control in a world where there is such a thing as compound interest and in this instance compound debt. When we are spending $110 million a day that we do not have, we are simply transferring what we are doing in 1994 to somebody way out there somewhere else.

I conclude my comments with a quick review. Bill C-52 is going in the right direction for all of the right reasons. If you will pardon me for nit-picking, I happened to notice in our review that a part of the purpose was that the deputy minister be appointed by cabinet.

It strikes me that the deputy ministers of all departments are people of great importance and strength. They give direction to their departments and strong counsel to their ministers. I suggest that the deputy minister not just in Bill C-52 but in other bills should appear before the standing committee. There should be more public scrutiny because more and more power is falling into the hands of the top civil servants. That would be a healthy thing to do.

In summary we are going in the right direction with Bill C-52. I do support that direction. I do see all of the things the last member was talking about, but it is not good enough by a long shot. We as politicians must generate a culture of acceptance of the fact that we are living beyond our means. We must be straight up with our voters. We must convince Canadians that we will be able to go in the right direction.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

Before questions and comments it is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Rosedale-Gun control; the hon. member for Verchères-Customs tariffs.