Ralph Goodale

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, there are certain principles of natural justice that might apply here. It is important to observe that while inquiries and investigations are being made, convictions have not been found.

I am perfectly happy to receive and consider other legal advice but--

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, the suspension of activities specifically relates to the sponsorship program. As I understand it, the company has some other relationships with other government departments that do not appear to have problems or issues associated with the company. As far as the information that I have before me tonight, those other relationships are perfectly in order.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, under the sponsorship program that is correct. That position was taken by my predecessor.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, with respect to issues related to sponsorship which is the particular topic of complaint here, I would remind the hon. gentleman that I explicitly froze the process as of Monday last week and it remains frozen. No new approvals have been made since that time. I indicated I wanted to be satisfied that the criteria of the programs were correct and that all the projects would fit within those criteria.

In terms of the publication of contracts, my understanding of the ordinary operating procedure is that all contracts issued by my department are automatically registered on the contracts Canada website.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, no, I cannot think of any that I have signed. I have in the normal course of events signed treasury board submissions that flow through the government review process but I have signed no direct contracts myself.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, bear in mind that the time period being considered here is that period between 1997 and 2000. The practices that have been identified as questionable relate to that time period prior to the year 2000. Corrective action began to be instituted in 2000 and following as a result of an internal audit that was conducted by the department of public works itself by an internal audit department that was recognized by the auditor general as being exceptional, excellent and courageous.

The corrective procedures are under way. If there is any evidence of illegality, that is a police responsibility to investigate.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, I have said, my predecessor has said and the auditors have said that is an unacceptable business practice. It has been corrected in the process of the internal audit that started in the year 2000 and the corrective measures that have been introduced since that time.

Where there are administrative errors, those errors are being corrected. If there is any evidence of any illegality, the matter is referred to the RCMP. We are taking the appropriate corrective action. Any insinuation to the contrary is simply wrong.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, the hon. gentleman is obviously ignoring the facts.

The Groupaction files were discovered by my predecessor. He called in the auditor general to examine those files. The auditor general did her work. She reported those files to the RCMP. The RCMP has confirmed that it is conducting an investigation.

Those are exactly the steps that should have been taken. They were taken promptly by the government and the matter is now being dealt with properly by the police.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, there is no question, given the size of the Government of Canada and the property management responsibilities of the Department of Public Works and Government Services, that we have a profound impact upon the quality of life in a great many urban areas across the country.

The recent work done by the Prime Minister's task force on urban issues, of which my hon. colleague is a member, will make a contribution to improving government policy in respect of urban communities with some constructive advice about how the government, including the department of public works, can better conduct itself in relation to urban communities and municipalities.

Tonight I am pleased to inform the House that we are working on a new explicit policy for my department that we will probably call our good neighbour policy. It is being finalized right now. It is intended to be an explicit statement of how this department will interact with local communities and municipal authorities in making the property management decisions that we need to make for the future proper administration of the Government of Canada. Obviously we need to meet the requirements of federal departments and must do so by being consistent with all Government of Canada policies and in a manner that is the most cost-effective.

However, in doing that we will take into account the needs and the requirements of local communities. The Government of Canada does not want to be an unwelcome intruder in an urban community. It wants to be a good and welcome neighbour.

The hon. member has referred to a number of circumstances in and around Halifax and Dartmouth where the Government of Canada already has a big impact. With the application of the good neighbour policy that impact will be increasingly positive.

I will give the member another example in practical terms of what this new policy could mean in relation to my own community in Regina. Some months ago the Government of Canada, through the Department of Public Works and Government Services, announced that it would be proceeding with the purchase of a downtown office tower and ultimately over time converting that office tower for Government of Canada purposes.

This announcement was well received broadly in Regina. The mayor, city council and local regional economic development authorities spoke positively about it. However, the economic development authority and the city council said there were other urban development objectives that they wished to achieve in downtown Regina. If the Government of Canada wanted to go about the development of this major property in the centre of the city in a certain way, then it had to contribute more broadly to the municipality's objectives.

All it calls for is dialogue, understanding, flexibility and a willingness to get along and trying to achieve everyone's mutual objectives in the best interests not only of the Government of Canada but of the local community.

I hope that within the next number of weeks, perhaps even faster than that, I might be in a position to formerly announce the good neighbour policy of the Department of Public Works and Government Services to ensure that we are not only meeting federal objectives but that we are also making a material, positive contribution to the local objectives as well.

[Supply, June 4th, 2002]

Madam Chairman, the publication in question is called “Services for You”. It was a national guide to the services available to Canadians from the Government of Canada. It was mailed last November to 11.7 million households in the country. The guide cost $4 million in total to print and distribute. That works out to 32¢ per copy to better inform Canadians of the many services that the Government of Canada offers them.

At about two-thirds of the cost of a first class stamp this initiative did provide us with good value for money. It provided useful information about tax reductions and benefits; retirement planning; health care; environmental protection; security, particularly in the wake of the events of September 11; Internet resources; and a variety of other activities.

One thing that was especially important about this particular distribution was that it was broken down on a regional basis. Part of the information provided was relative and timely with respect to all Canadians in all parts of the country and part of the information was directly aimed at subject matters that would be of particular interest to people in a particular region.

For example, in the Ontario edition there was information about cleaning up the Great Lakes and internship programs in northern Ontario. In British Columbia there was information about the Gulf Islands ecosystems and about certain local initiatives dealing with homelessness. In Quebec there were issues related to the environment, youth, the RCMP's drug awareness services and so forth. I could go through 11 different versions of the guide that tailored information to what Canadians in different parts of the country would be particularly interested in.

One thing that was important was that in every case the information included access to Government of Canada information and services, the 1-800 O-Canada line and the Government of Canada website. For anybody who is listening at this hour of night it is www.canada.gc.ca. One can get virtually every bit of information that one might want to have about the Government of Canada.

I note that in the market research we did with respect to programs of this kind we found a full 42% of Canadians saying they did not have enough information about government services that were available to them and were making requests for more information of that kind.