Government Operations committee  Mr. Chair, I'm not in a position to assess the value for money of those contracts.

Government Operations committee  Initially with Coradix and Dalian, it was for a wide range of IT services. Not all of the services under the contract were identified at the beginning, as I think testimony has shown before on this. There was a requirement to design something to aid the department in terms of their approach to addressing sexual harassment, and that's why they brought in GC Strategies and Botler.

Government Operations committee  Thank you for the question. I think it has been indicated before that there's an RCMP investigation. There's also an investigation within CBSA to look at this specific instance to see how this took place. I will say we are very concerned and very interested in ensuring the integrity of the procurement system.

Government Operations committee  Mr. Chair, I do take umbrage with the fact that there's no limit. As we mentioned before, this is a competitive environment. The ultimate IT experts, who are doing the work with the necessary experience and skills, will not work for zero. They actually demand a wage. It's a—

Government Operations committee  No.

Government Operations committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the question. In certain cases, as in this one, there are two types of task-based contracts—deliverables-based and individual-based. In the case of a deliverables-based contract, it is a requirement of the company to figure out how best to bring the resources to meet the requirement that the government puts forward.

Government Operations committee  No.

Government Operations committee  It's a quick answer, Mr. Chair. You'd have to direct that question to Indigenous Services Canada, which administers that program.

Government Operations committee  To begin, I would note that most of these instruments...The TBIPS is a competitive instrument, so when we put out a requirement, it is actually a requirement to compete for that among many firms. It is typical that we may have many respondents, and much of the selection and winning is based on the price of each of the resources at the different levels.

Government Operations committee  There is no set of regulations that bars it. These contracts are awarded under competition, so the prevailing market rates limit how much firms can ultimately charge.

Government Operations committee  Mr. Chair, with respect to the certification of personnel, whether they are actually requested is optional. In this case here, we would have to go back to the CBSA to see whether or not they actually requested those documents.

Government Operations committee  Mr. Chair, it's not our normal process to verify with subcontractors, after payments have been paid out, whether primes paid their subs.

Government Operations committee  Mr. Chair, we'd be happy to undertake—with CBSA's chief financial officer, who is responsible for paying invoices—seeing whether they've had complaints of non-payment from subcontractors.

Government Operations committee  To the best of my knowledge, the security requirements for subcontractors were verified by CBSA.

Government Operations committee  I did not personally receive any complaints about anyone having concerns with the statements of work with respect to those contracts. I don't know if anyone else among our team received any complaints.