National Defence committee  It's difficult for me, Mr. Chair, to comment on morale in the Canadian Armed Forces. I'm no longer in the Canadian Armed Forces. That's probably a better question for some of the commanders.

National Defence committee  Thank you for that question. Mr. Chair, I'm not sure of the precise numbers with respect to a lapse, and we have different terminology within departments with respect to carry-forwards, which we're allowed to—

National Defence committee  —carry forward. I can't comment on that actual number. I would tell you that project teams will bring down extra contingency into their annual spending plans, because they're always anticipating the unanticipated. I want to make sure that they have the contingency money availab

National Defence committee  Again, I'm not sure where you're getting the numbers from for a 23% lapse. I'm unable to comment. We reprofile money from year to year. I'm unaware of the 23% figure, but I'd be happy to look into it.

National Defence committee  Off the top of my head, Mr. Chair, I don't know what we paid for the Chinooks in theatre. The Chinooks we purchased were a more recent model. The ones in theatre were a D model. The ones that we just purchased were an F model. The last of them was delivered in June 2014, and that

National Defence committee  Despite the fact that we move a lot of program every year, I think there's obviously room for improvement in the overall defence procurement process. I think everybody would be in agreement with that. As a result, we spend a lot of time working on a defence procurement strategy

National Defence committee  I think that following NSPS the timelines that have been developed for the delivery of the joint support ship, the Arctic offshore patrol ship, and the Canadian service combatant are timelines that are realistic and that will deliver real capability on an acceptable timeline and

National Defence committee  The department can reprofile funding and did so a couple of years back with respect to $3 billion that couldn't be spent in accordance with the original schedules around some major procurements. That money was profiled to the time at which the actual procurement was going to deli

National Defence committee  You mentioned the joint support ship. One of the lessons from that.... That procurement was cancelled because of the procurement strategy, which had us dealing with two design teams. Once we put out the request for proposal, we weren't able to get into detailed cost-capability tr

National Defence committee  I think that when there's an urgent operational requirement, Mr. Chair, the emphasis is on getting the equipment to the personnel who need it as soon as possible. In many cases, that will lead to a sole-source procurement. We may be getting the capability we want, but we may be p

National Defence committee  I couldn't give you an actual example, because there would be nothing to compare it to. On a sole-source procurement, we pay what the asking price is. If there had been a competitive process, there may have been a cheaper option, but whether it would have delivered the same capab

National Defence committee  I served for 26 years, including my time at the military college.

National Defence committee  It's a very good question. There are three components to any major military procurement. There are always factors around cost, capability, and schedule. Sometimes we'll consciously sacrifice schedule to make sure that we get the most capability for the dollar available. When we

National Defence committee  I get to work on the same files, but at a slightly higher level. We have governance around major procurements at the DG level—the director general level—the ADM level, and the deputy minister level. I support John Forster at the deputy minister level in dealing with deputy collea

National Defence committee  The ADM materiel reports to Mr. Forster, who is the deputy minister but works very closely with me.