Madam Speaker, before I start, I would like to point out that I will be sharing my time with my esteemed and extraordinary colleague on the team investigating ArriveCAN and GC Strategies, my colleague from Terrebonne.
The Auditor General's report noted omissions in the processes for awarding and monitoring contracts with GC Strategies. We are requesting an additional step: verifying whether taxpayers got their money's worth. I will remind you of a few elements concerning GC Strategies, which also concern everything surrounding ArriveCAN. This reminder is important because it will help us better understand why we are talking about the report, as well as the request it contains.
In recent years, the Government of Canada has been awarding more and more contracts to consultants. The number of contracts awarded for consulting services, coordination or outsourcing and the total amounts associated with these contracts have significantly increased, not to say skyrocketed.
ArriveCAN was one of these contracts. ArriveCAN got under way between 2015 and 2017. When the pandemic hit, the machinery of government went on overdrive to help Canada Border Services Agency officers manage our borders and travellers once the borders reopened. The problem was that, instead of looking to government employees to see if there was anyone specialized in programming, the work was outsourced. Perhaps we did not have the necessary internal resources. I would be surprised, because a lot of money has been spent in recent years on cybersecurity services, updating the cloud and building telecommunications and Web infrastructures.
Still, let us say that no one was available and that we had to outsource. Apparently, not only did we not have any employees specializing in web applications programming, whether Android, iOS or website platforms, but we also had no employees who were capable of searching LinkedIn or other networks to find such specialists. Therein lies the problem.
Beyond the fact that millions of dollars were given to a company, it is the shortcomings we must bring to light. It is the process for hiring and monitoring employees. It is about making sure to have the right person in the right place, and ensuring that their competencies are recognized, even if the person is not necessarily where they should be based on their skills. For example, an officer working for employment insurance may well have programming skills, but they were not hired for that. It is quite possible that another officer working for employment insurance has archives-related skills but they were not hired for that. If we do not consider these people's skills from the outset, then, when they are needed, we will be out of luck. We will then hire a consultant who ends up doing a search on LinkedIn and receive 10% to 30% of the total contract amount just for finding people who are sitting around. Are we truly getting our money's worth when this happens?
With ArriveCAN, there were problems. Perhaps my colleagues will say that, for the number of downloads and uses, the number of problems was minimal, and in percentage terms that is true, to be sure. Then again, try talking to the 10,000 people who were stuck in a hotel or at home for two weeks and who lost wages because the thingamajig made a mistake and the human being in charge of the thingamajig failed to check whether there was a problem with the machine or whether the person made a false declaration.
We should keep in mind that every app is prone to errors. I know that artificial intelligence is all the rage right now, but let us not forget that although AI can learn by itself, it was programmed by a human being, and human beings are fallible. The same was true of ArriveCAN.
There is also the fact that this app was imposed on Canada Border Services employees who had not been properly trained, and that this was over and above their other duties. This caused problems at the border, which comes under federal jurisdiction.
Earlier, my colleague mentioned the official opposition, which is against anything having to do with social programs, such as pharmacare or dental insurance. We may oppose the way these programs were rolled out, for instance, the fact that they do not respect the jurisdictions of Quebec and the provinces, and still agree with the principle of insurance. However, if we wasted less money consulting people and recognizing their competencies, the provinces that accept these intrusions into their areas of jurisdiction might have more money.
Consultation, particularly when it comes to ArriveCAN and other contracts, like GC Strategies, causes other problems and raises other questions. I mentioned these briefly earlier in my question. The issue is responsibility. Who is responsible? Do we put enough money into training public servants and managers? At some point, a manager needs to manage. If they do not manage, is that one of the reasons why we end up with situations where money seems to fly out the window, as if we thought it grew on trees? Money does not grow on trees; it comes directly out of the pockets of taxpayers who earned it by the sweat of their brow.
Let us get back to requesting the Auditor General to do a complete analysis of the situation. She is responsible. She seeks transparency. She seeks accountability. She does not try to point fingers at a guilty party. She works to make sure that processes are applied properly and that taxpayer money is managed responsibly. Responsibility does not mean that someone will lose their job because they made a mistake. Responsibility means that an individual is able to recognize they made a mistake and to present a solution to improve the situation and become more responsible.
That is what the 13th report requests.