Information & Ethics committee  I took many meetings, as did my staff, with companies like that. As I say, it was a matter of routine. The largest companies in the world in manufacturing, software and logistics came to see us, offered their help and wanted to know what they could do. That was routine. I can't

Information & Ethics committee  To get the best possible answer to this question, I think you should ask my colleagues at Health Canada and perhaps my colleagues at the Department of Public Services and Procurement. I can only speak from my own experience. When ISED worked with Canadian industry, it was honest

Information & Ethics committee  I'm sorry. Although Canada Economic Development Canada, or CED, is part of ISED, I'm not directly responsible for it. That responsibility rests with one of my colleagues. I could talk about it with my colleagues and come back to the committee with a response, but I don't have th

Information & Ethics committee  I don't remember the specific date. It would have been sometime in March. To be frank, we also had an official website that we set up with an address. You could fill in details about what your offer was. You could actually go online and say, for instance, “I'm a manufacturer. I c

Information & Ethics committee  No. Obviously, there was the report of Mr. Dion that talked about various officials and political staff, but at the time, this was just another company among the thousands, frankly, that were pouring in, looking to help out. It didn't stand out as some special company. It was ver

Information & Ethics committee  Just by way of context, as I noted earlier, ISED is an organization that interacts with hundreds and in fact thousands of businesses. It has been my experience, not just at Health Canada but in all of my other ministries, that if you are dealing regularly with the business commun

Information & Ethics committee  I would say that's true across the aisle. My experience has been that it is very typical—

Information & Ethics committee  I certainly make it my absolute rule to try to follow the rules to the letter and make sure that I behave in a way that is ethical. I would say that I and my senior civil service colleagues take that very seriously. We know, frankly, how it can lead to significant heartache for a

Information & Ethics committee  I think if I had known that there was a breach of the rules going on, I would have declined to attend. I think that's pretty obvious. I think that would have been the default position of most of my colleagues. As I say, I meet with a lot of—

Information & Ethics committee  Mr. Chair, I think questions about whether rules were broken are best directed to those with whom that is at issue. In my case, I followed all the rules we normally follow. I deal with hundreds of businesses a year. I've dealt routinely with businesses that have former politician

Information & Ethics committee  We have very rigorous processes for contract due diligence. An internal team is mandated to review each contract. Before proceeding and awarding a contract, this team verifies all legal requirements and conflict of interest issues, among others. We have established internal fina

Information & Ethics committee  I'm comfortable saying that our processes are working well. Even in an emergency situation, such as a pandemic, we always apply the rules. There is no question of disregarding them. From time to time, it may be necessary to make decisions based on less information than normal. F

Information & Ethics committee  So—

Information & Ethics committee  We have taken some steps. First of all, there must be good documentation of the reasons for the decisions made. In emergency situations, it is still necessary to keep the paperwork and keep a complete history of the decision-making process to be able to justify our actions. We

Information & Ethics committee  It was the public services and procurement ministry.