Government Operations committee  These options were developed over 48 hours. There's a very real possibility that at that time things were moving so quickly nobody even knew what company or staff augmentation would be required. There are many companies out there that do this type of work, so the first thing is, let's land on a technical direction.

Government Operations committee  The deck was not fairly detailed. It was developed in 48 hours. It was mostly mock-ups and screens of what the first version that cost $80,000 could potentially look like. You cannot do a fairly detailed deck in 48 hours.

Government Operations committee  There was no precise cost in this. As I said, it was developed in 48 hours. It was basically asking, in what direction do we want to go? There were early screens of what replacing a paper form could look like. At that time, I don't believe anybody had—

Government Operations committee  The procurement and contracting processes were followed. Public Services and Procurement Canada was consulted at all stages. In terms of governance, in terms of decisions on technical needs that were made in 24 hours, 48 hours or 72 hours, the processes were not followed. There were gaps in documentation, but we were in a crisis and in the middle of a pandemic.

Government Operations committee  Given all my responsibilities at the time, including the closure of customs, I delegated decision-making to executives, which my position allows me to do. I trusted Mr. MacDonald. As I already told you, he made a decision for the first version of the application, which cost $80,000.

Government Operations committee  To the best of my knowledge, contract authority procurement teams within CBSA would have verified all those things before work could be started.

Government Operations committee  I believe there are two parts to that question, in terms of NDAs and subcontracting. The first part is the term “ghost contracting”. I must admit that, in my 25 years of experience, it's not a term with which I am familiar. It's not a term I have heard. If what you are referring to is subcontracting, that practice, I believe, has been explained many times.

Government Operations committee  Thank you for the question. No, that is not what I said. All the groups or subcontractors working on a project have to follow the same rules, including those relating to security. When a candidate is submitted to us, regardless of the subcontracting level, the rules have to be followed—

Government Operations committee  I didn't become aware of the existence of GC Strategies until well into the pandemic.

Government Operations committee  I would have to go back into my records to confirm.

Government Operations committee  I was not briefing the minister or the minister's office about this at this time or in the fall of last year. Nobody was looking for a proverbial head. The question that was raised last year was, why did it cost $54 million and was it value for money? One of the sub-questions that was making the media was, why, among the 30 or more companies that we worked with to develop ArriveCAN, would one of those companies be relatively small?

Government Operations committee  Nobody raised that question. Nobody raised that concern.

Government Operations committee  I was not briefed on the concerns of the minister's office. I was and still continue to be very proud of the ArriveCAN work. GC Strategies was one among 30-something companies we worked with to deliver this, and it was tireless over two and a half years.

Government Operations committee  There were questions to make sure that we could justify and explain, because it was proper—

Government Operations committee  The entire agency—everybody. We defended those numbers.