44th Parl. 1st Sess.
March 21, 2023 10:00AM
Madam Speaker, thank you for announcing to the House that I will be delivering the late show later this evening. If, after this speech, the member for Winnipeg North and others feel they have not heard enough, they can certainly stick around.
Just to preview a little, I will be speaking at that time about the Liberal McKinsey scandal, about the fact that the government—
Some hon. members: Which one?
Mr. Garnett Genuis: Madam Speaker, I have to say there are so many scandals that it is hard to keep track. We are going to need to publish a scandal almanac so we will know exactly which one at all times.
This is the scandal in which the Liberal government gave over $100 million in contracts to McKinsey, a company with a very shady record of activity around the world that includes, most concerning to many Canadians, giving advice to Purdue Pharma on how to supercharge the opioid crisis. Stick around for that, Madam Speaker. I will be speaking to that later tonight. You may not have a choice. There will be someone in the chair, regardless.
On the issue of Bill C-23, I was speaking about the government's engagement in terms of consultation with indigenous Canadians. I think, sadly but very clearly, what we have seen with the government when it comes to engaging with indigenous communities is that it has always been a one-way street. If there are indigenous organizations or communities expressing opposition to development projects, the government says it has to listen and it has to really elevate the voices on that side of the debate.
On the other hand, if we have indigenous communities, organizations or nations that are supportive of development, that want to see development projects proceed, then the government very clearly does not listen. It tries to elevate one perspective that exists within indigenous communities while ignoring another.
Let us acknowledge that, within any community of people, there is going to be a diversity of perspectives about the best way to proceed on certain issues. Development projects can be one of those contentious areas where there will be differences of opinion.
The government takes a very one-sided approach to its supposed commitment to consultation. What sticks out to me most in this regard is some time that I spent in northern territories and meeting with indigenous leaders there who talked about development restrictions the government had imposed with absolutely no consultation. It was sort of a phone call to a premier right before an announcement was made. That is how the government stopped development projects, yet it talks increasingly as if proponents of projects, those proceeding with development projects, have to get to something near unanimity.
If we realize that, in the process of talking about consulting indigenous Canadians, the government is actually interested in listening to only one side of the equation, then we realize that it is not about meaningful consultation but about the government trying to find people within indigenous communities who share its perspective and ignoring people who have a different perspective.
I fully acknowledge the diversity of views that exist in any community on development projects, but I know, certainly with people I talk to, indigenous peoples living in my riding and others across the country, there is a sizable constituency out there saying that natural resource development projects in particular contribute to jobs and opportunity growth, and that is very positive for these communities.
In the process of that consultation, it is important to ensure that the government is hearing from the full spectrum of opinions. However, what we then often see is that, when the government is creating consultation mechanisms, it preserves for itself control of who actually participates in that consultation mechanism. There was a bill that the government put forward recently creating an indigenous advisory council. In that context, the minister would be able to do the initial appointments. On the one hand, it was saying the government wants to consult with people from indigenous communities, but on the other hand, it would choose the people it is consulting.
That obviously takes away, to some extent, from the meaningfulness that could have been realized if representatives were not selected by the government that was then going to consult with them about a specific issue. I flag this because this legislation, Bill C-23, speaks about setting aside seats for first nations, Inuit and Métis representatives on the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada, but the process of appointment retains substantial control over those appointments in the hands of the government. It is saying it would appoint from these communities, but it is going to be the one doing those appointments. That is something important to flag in whether this would be effective.
As I said, Conservatives are supportive of the principle of having certain sites with genuine historic significance being thus designated, and of having particular frameworks around the protection of those sites once they are thus designated. We are supportive of that in principle. We will be supporting this legislation at the second reading stage, which is where we are at, and this is where we consider the general concept of a bill in principle.
The rubber is going to hit the road when we get to the committee study on this legislation and when we work through how to ensure the government is not able to use this legislation to such a general extent as to be able to put a halt to development projects anywhere and to use the designation of a place as having historic significance to block development. It is worth saying, sort of as a bit of a coda, that almost any place is probably of some significance to someone, so the broad enabling power this legislation could give government is something we need to be very careful of.
How limited is its use going to be? Is it going to be so broad as to be open to the Minister of Environment? He, let us be clear, has a particular animus for the energy sector and development in that sector and he, at one time, illegally climbed onto the roof of the premier of Alberta's home to protest that premier's policies. We see, rightly, condemnation of instances where politicians in protests are targeted in their homes, but the Minister of Environment has never addressed his record on this. We know he has a particular approach when it comes to development in this sector, so giving such significant enabling powers to the government, to the Minister of Environment in particular, raises some red flags. That is why the rubber will hit the road at the committee stage of this bill.
Finally, the approach of Conservatives is to recognize that, reasonably, there is a role for government, but we want to do everything we can to get red tape and gatekeeping out of people's lives; make people's interactions with government simpler, clearer and more predictable; reduce their taxes; and give them more control over their own lives.
Our goal as a party is to realize a fuller vision of human freedom, where people can live in strong communities and strong families, independent of government overreach and government bureaucratic control, and independent of the bureaucratization of every aspect of their lives. That is the vision our leader has articulated about removing gatekeepers, defending freedom and recognizing that strong individuals, families and communities are the fundamentals of life far more important than government.
While we recognize some value in the principle of this legislation, I can assure members that we will continue to be vigilant to ensure the government, to the extent we are able, is blocked from overreaches into people's lives, that we fully realize that vision of human freedom. I suspect it will take a new government, a new Conservative government, to bring us to that point, but for the time being, we will use the opportunities we have in opposition to do precisely that.
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- Mar/21/23 6:50:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to speak to the government's relationship with McKinsey in a follow-up to a question I had asked. This has been an important issue for me and an important issue for the opposition.
Why is it important? Well, there are a number of reasons. First, the government has spent over $100 million on contracts for McKinsey, work that public servants have told the media that, in many cases, could have been done inside the public service.
More broadly, we are seeing a significant increase in spending on outside consultants by the government at the same time as we are seeing growth in the public service. The government is spending more inside the public service, and it is spending more to contract out activities as well, so there is a basic fiscal probity question at play here, but there are also some other issues that I think are very important as we look at the government's relationship with McKinsey.
One is that Dominic Barton, the managing partner of McKinsey, was leading the Prime Minister's growth council, having special access through that growth council to ministers and the government at the same time that McKinsey was pitching services for sale to the government. We know from emails that a Mr. Pickersgill, who was working for McKinsey, was supplying analysts for the growth council at the same time as he was sending emails to the government requesting work. We have seen those emails, so, very clearly, there are questions of conflict of interest.
There are other issues of conflict of interest. The fact that the Minister of Defence, yesterday, at the operations committee, was asked if it is acceptable for McKinsey to do work for the Canadian Department of Defence at the same time as it is potentially working for other departments of defence for hostile actors around the world and learning things from our Department of Defence that it may be using in those other interactions.
The Minister of National Defence did not know, or was not willing or able to tell the committee, which other departments of defence around the world McKinsey was working for, but we were told by the deputy minister not to worry because the information and the issues that McKinsey are working on are not that secret. Really, they are just talking about operational structural details, which it is not getting access to national security. They are just operational aspects of the work of government and so forth.
On the other hand, the minister was unwilling to provide basic information about these contracts to the committee unredacted. What we heard from the Minister of National Defence and her department was effectively that the information is not so secret that we need to worry about what McKinsey may be learning and using in its engagements with other hostile powers, but at the same time, the information is so secret that it could not even be shared with members of a parliamentary committee, despite the order to produce that content.
A final issue I will raise tonight is the fact that McKinsey worked for Purdue Pharma and gave them advice specifically on how to supercharge opioid sales. That is not an issue of something happening beyond our borders. The opioid crisis has affected so many Canadians. I think that every family has, in some way, been touched by the opioid crisis.
McKinsey specifically advised Purdue Pharma on how to turbocharge its sales engine. That advice included, for instance, how to circumvent traditional pharmacies by operating mail-in pharmacies to circumvent the controls that were being put in place in traditional pharmacies. That advice included paying bonuses for overdoses that occurred. This was advice that McKinsey provided to Purdue Pharma at the same time that McKinsey was working for the Government of Canada, and at the same time that Dominic Barton was leading McKinsey and leading the Prime Minister's growth council.
Why is the government willing to do business with McKinsey? Why is it comfortable with the risks this poses in fundamental ethics, the opioid crisis issues, as well as the conflict of interest issues?
We have repeatedly raised the broader question of all the money that is being spent on these outside consultants. The government's relation with McKinsey stinks, and it needs to be addressed.
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- Mar/21/23 6:54:23 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, it is always a pleasure to spar with the hon. member for Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, who is definitely one of my favourite members to talk to in the House.
Let me start by referencing one of the things that the hon. member said in questioning our minister. He said, “The Prime Minister is a very close personal friend of Dominic Barton, who is the managing partner of McKinsey.” As we know, Dominic Barton has not been the managing partner of McKinsey for the last five years and he is not a very close personal friend to the Prime Minister.
In fact, when we had Dominic Barton before our committee, I had a chance to ask Mr. Barton some questions. I asked if he was one of the Prime Minister's five best friends. He said no. I asked if the Prime Minister was one of his 10 best friends. He said no. I asked if the Prime Minister was one of his 25 best friends. He said no. I asked if the Prime Minister was one of his 50 best friends. He said no.
I asked if he had the Prime Minister's phone number. He said no. I asked if he ever had dinner with the Prime Minister. He said no. I asked if the Prime Minister's wife and his wife ever socialized. He said no. I asked if he considered the Prime Minister to be a friend. He said no. I asked if he ever worked out with the Prime Minister. He said no. One of the things I do with my friends is work out. We play tennis, we swim and we run. In any case, I do not think that Dominic Barton is a close personal friend to the Prime Minister.
Another thing that has been referenced again today is that, “Dominic Barton was running a government advisory body while at the same time his company was collecting over $100 million in contracts on the side.” That is also not true. Almost all of the contracts that went to McKinsey, and we are talking about $115 million in contracts, of which about $104 million from our department, Public Services and Procurement Canada, came after Dominic Barton was no longer the managing partner at McKinsey.
Whatever shares he had with McKinsey were divested the moment he left McKinsey. He clarified at committee, and my dear friend from Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan was at committee, that he had zero financial interest left in McKinsey and did not have any financial interest at the time that 99% of these agreements were actually entered into with the government.
What we are seeing are two very important issues. There is the question of whether we should be reducing the amount of outsourcing in the federal public service. As we know, federal public servants themselves determine when outsourcing is needed, such as when there is a surge capacity required or when there is work that is outside the core mandate of the federal civil service.
However, that does not mean we should not look and see if we need policies that will further reduce the number of times we outsource, because of course there is an added cost when we outsource. The minister has been tasked, along with the president of the Treasury Board, to look into this specific question.
My hon. friend and I share a very strong commitment to human rights-related foreign policy. One of the things we should be looking at, which we are looking at and I hope the OGGO committee will focus on, is what changes to the integrity regime should disqualify companies from bidding on business from the Government of Canada.
Unfortunately, what has happened is that this has become entangled in a question about McKinsey. There has been a political narrative some people have tried to build that somehow McKinsey is close, personal friends with the government and getting contracts in an untoward manner, which is not the case.
We have unfortunately moved away from the large policy questions we should be focused on, which I think Liberals, Conservatives, New Democrats and Bloc members could perhaps all agree on. Let us get to an OGGO report and let us stop having meetings about McKinsey.
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- Mar/21/23 6:59:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I would disagree with my hon. friend about whether working out is a way to bond or not. I invite him to come run with me; if you want to join, Mr. Speaker, I would be delighted to have you and the hon. member for Winnipeg North as well.
In the end result, the committee should be focused on the big picture questions of whether we should outsource as much as we do and whether the integrity regime needs to be changed. The question of whether McKinsey got contracts is not the issue. Moreover, if it indeed got contracts in the way my hon. colleague is suggesting, it has done a terrible job because it has way fewer contracts than comparable companies do. Almost all of them are from after Dominic Barton left. The issue is not whether our federal public service has appropriately given contracts to McKinsey. It is a question of the large policy issues.
I share the hon. member's objective. Hopefully, we can co-operate in getting to a better place.
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