Government Operations committee  I'll echo my colleague's comments—it comes down to the procurement requirement itself, what benefits you're trying to achieve under the requirement, and making sure those are consistent with your treaty agreement obligations. To the extent that you can allow for that, then yes. T

Government Operations committee  To answer your question a little more holistically, when I said that now we're allowed to look into the use of set-asides because of the CFTA, don't forget that there's a domestic framework as well. We have to abide by the Financial Administration Act. In the government contracti

Government Operations committee  I don't have it with me.

Government Operations committee  That would be a question that probably would be best answered by our folks over at Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada. The reason I say that is that an aboriginal business under PSAB must be registered with our colleagues in INAC—

Government Operations committee  —and then those types of complaints would go more to them.

Government Operations committee  In my experience, no. It's a recognized derogation from the general rules. In my experience, the answer to the question is no.

Government Operations committee  Perhaps I will supplement the response by saying it's very early on. The principles are engage early, engage meaningfully, and engage often. It's very early on in the stage of setting procurement requirements that the requirements for steel, for example, are set, as well as the n

Government Operations committee  Within the procurement strategy for aboriginal business, PSAB, there are qualifiers and definitions for what constitutes an aboriginal business. It could relate to ownership, participation, number of employees, and so on and so forth. During the session on PSAB that I understand

Government Operations committee  Perhaps I'll take the lead. Up until July of this year, we were restricted as government from exploring the use of set-asides for small and medium-sized enterprises to further Canadian programs, because the agreement on internal trade simply did not allow for set-asides for smal

Government Operations committee  We do have a number of means by which we report. The first is on our public-facing website. We do have some statistics available under the PSPC public-facing website. We also have statistics available through Treasury Board Secretariat as part of their open data initiative. In t

Government Operations committee  It's fortuitous, Mr. Chair. In closing, I hope—

Government Operations committee  —I've been able to clearly outline PSPC's obligations vis-à-vis the complex web of international trade rules. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to this matter. I look forward to your questions.

Government Operations committee  It is. Well said.

Government Operations committee  Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members. My name is Matthew Sreter. I'm the executive director of the strategic policy development and integration directorate for the acquisitions program at Public Services and Procurement Canada, PSPC. Thank you for the opportu