COLUMN: On Parliament Hill – The buck stops here

You may know the expression “pass the buck,” which means responsibility and accountability are passed on to someone else. From “pass the buck” came the expression “the buck stops here,” which was popularised by U.S. President Harry S. Truman. The idea is that once the complaint/concern hits that presidential desk, the full “buck” of responsibility or blame ends there.

That is because leaders step up and take ownership of what happens under their scope of responsibility.

This past week, the auditor general released a scathing report confirming some of our worst fears. The investigation resulted from a Conservative motion passed on Nov. 2, 2022, in the House of Commons to study ArriveCAN (GC Strategies), originally budgeted at $80,000—but later surpassed $60 million.

The auditor general’s report revealed that 106 contracts were awarded to GC Strategies across 31 federal organizations, totalling $92.7 million, of which $64.5 million has already been paid.

Worse, the report highlighted that security was not enforced, contracts were not monitored, and procurement policies were not followed when awarding contracts. Twenty-one percent of contracts included people without the required security clearances. In 33 percent of the cases, there was no verification on whether people were qualified to do the work. And additionally, in almost half of the contracts, there was no follow-up on whether the services were even delivered. In other words, there was no evidence that the work was even done.

Of deep concern, in 82 percent of cases, departments didn’t check if taxpayers were overpaying. In 50 percent of contracts, security clearances weren’t properly enforced—even in sensitive departments like Global Affairs and National Defence. A total collapse of basic oversight, but taxpayers are still forced to pay while Liberal insiders get rich.

As debate ensued in the House of Commons, one Liberal Member of Parliament made the wild claim that Conservatives didn’t understand how elected government is different from the bureaucracy, and ministers can’t be held responsible for the work of the bureaucrats. When in fact, the reverse is true. Public servants do the job as directed by the mandate of ministers, who are accountable to Parliament. To suggest otherwise is a wild assertion of passing the buck.

Here’s the thing: Liberal Ministers who oversaw the fiasco continue to serve in the new Prime Minister’s Cabinet, and many even received promotions. Key ministers responsible at that time are once again in the inner circle of government.

Clearly, many “bucks” were passed around because of this report—bucks that needed to stop at the various ministers for their lack of foresight and mismanagement.

However, based on the findings of the GC Strategies report, Conservatives are asking the obvious questions: How will we get Canadians back their $64.5 million? And how do we enforce real consequences—such as lifetime contracting bans for GC Strategies, its subsidiaries, and founders?

Canadians need to know. While the questions remain unanswered, the Conservative Opposition Day motion was as follows:

That, given that the auditor general found that ArriveCAN contractor, GC Strategies Inc., was paid $64 million from the Liberal government, and in many cases, there was no proof that any work was completed, the House calls on the government to:

(a) Get taxpayers their money back, within 100 days of the adoption of this motion; and

(b) Impose a lifetime contracting ban on GC Strategies Inc., any of its subsidiaries, its founders Kristian Firth and Darren Anthony, and any other entities with which those individuals are affiliated.

The motion was passed on Monday afternoon with the support of all members, except for members of the Liberal government.