CIMM#53: Government Operations Committee on Federal Government Consulting Contracts Awarded to McKinsey & Company

House of Commons Debate
Government Operations Committee on Feb. 15th, 2023
Evidence of meeting #53 for Government Operations and Estimates in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session.

 
4:55 p.m.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the minister and officials for appearing before the committee.

I just want to establish the process with respect to policy decisions. I fully anticipate and expect that it's the minister who makes these decisions. However, before the minister does, often officials will provide briefing documents and recommendations for the minister's consideration. 

Is that the case for the immigration levels numbers or any other policy within IRCC?

Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liberal

Ms. Kwan, I want to make sure I answer your question. If I need to extend this to make sure I don't dodge it on you here, I'd be happy to.

The policy process, of course, comes to me. At the end of the day, my signature goes on whatever policy decisions we take. Sometimes there are delegated authorities to departments, but it's common for us to receive advice from different groups that could lead to recommendations. That is not a unique practice.

In addition to whatever exercise the department may undertake, I will on many occasions engage with stakeholders or partners directly.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

My question is this. At any point in time, did McKinsey engage in discussions or meetings with officials where they might have discussed policy decisions, or did work that would have implications for policy decisions? To that end, could the minister provide a list of the officials who actually met with McKinsey and what topics they discussed?


Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liberal

I think my deputy minister, who's in the room, would be better positioned to discuss engagement at the officials level with McKinsey.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Maybe the easiest thing would be that, if there is such a list, we could receive that list of where McKinsey had engaged in discussions with officials. Could you provide that list and what topics they discussed?

My next question is this. The minister said that there wasn't the capacity or they needed McKinsey to help build capacity within IRCC, yet IRCC staff within the department are on the public record as saying that they offered to work with the government with ideas and forwarded these ideas, and there was zero uptake. IRCC, by the way, is the one department within government that contracts out more work than any other department. That has been confirmed with a PIPSC report. 

The other thing that has been noted is that IRCC does not make a reasonable effort to hire before contracting out. As well, IRCC has more grievances than any other department within government. This is on the public record, in a report that's there for everyone to see.

Given the comment that people tried to offer their ideas and suggestions, why were those not received well and taken up?


Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liberal

I have a different view, with great respect, Ms. Kwan, on your allegation about our being slow to hire and also on the interplay between McKinsey and officials within the department. 

To be a little bit more specific, my view, of course coming in after some of the work was performed, is that the collaboration that took place between the consulting firm and the department actually did help grow the capacity. We're starting to see some of the work that has come about as a result of the groundwork that was done a few years ago result in new digital processes.

With respect to the allegation about being slow to hire, since the past summer we've hired more than—


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I'm sorry. I'm going to interrupt you here, Minister. I think you might have misheard me. It wasn't slow to hire. The issue is that the government and the department chose to contract out instead of hiring in-house. 

In fact, there's a report here that I'll turn the minister's attention to, the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada's “Contracting Out Report”, which actually outlines very clearly the contracting out of IRCC and how it's actually breaching the collective agreement, by the way, in the number of grievances that exist within the system. That's there and on the record. 

It has also been reported by CBC that staff within IRCC had offered to work with the department on some of these issues, yet that offer was not taken up.

I think the point here is that there is a systemic problem, I would suggest, within IRCC, then, where the workers are not being valued and we're not utilizing the talent from within. There needs to be an explanation as to why there is this level of contracting out that IRCC has engaged in with McKinsey.


Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liiberal

First, let me dispel any misconceptions that, somehow, there isn't respect for the public service. They are and have been doing extraordinary work under very difficult circumstances, particularly over the past few years. We ask an awful lot of them as we seek to grow our immigration ambition, and I'm grateful for the work that they do.

With respect to the specific contracts that we're talking about with McKinsey and IRCC, my view is that it was in an area that was both time-limited and that required incremental work that wasn't within the capacity...not to operate a new digital system in perpetuity but to help build the capacity to finish the design and implementation of it.

The contracts were entered into within the department, not at a ministerial level. If there's supplementary information that the deputy minister has on this, I would be happy to give her time to offer an explanation.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I will say this—


The Chair Kelly McCauley
Conservative

I'm afraid that's our time.

We're now into our second round of five minutes with Mr. Paul-Hus.
5:15 p.m.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

IRCC has 327 IT employees. That's fewer than half of what Correctional Service Canada has and about half as many as CBSA. Between January 2018 and September 2022, IRCC used 270 IT contracts but only hired 23 permanent positions. If IRCC needs IT for this transformation that the minister's talking about, why isn't IRCC hiring public servants to do this work instead of contracting it out? 

How many staff, permanent positions, could the department get with $24.8 million?


Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liberal

For clarification—and I may have to point to my deputy to confirm the numbers—I believe we've added about 160 new IT staff. This would include designers and IT specialists. The bigger point to me is not just the design of the system and people who have IT skills but developing a system where our staff who process ordinary cases will have the ability to use the digital system on the back end.

To my deputy, if there's further clarity you'd like to offer on the numbers, I'd be happy to yield the floor.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Maybe the minister can have staff table those numbers dating back over the last five years in terms of what the trend is and the dollars spent on contracting out that have gone out correspondingly to date. I think that would be useful.

The other thing, of course, with IT staff is that it includes programmers as well. With my information, programmers were almost 60 times as many contracted out, but there were only two advertisements during this period for regular employees. Again, why isn't the government hiring in-house instead of contracting out? You're talking about $24.8 million for this transformation.

I also want to point that, at the CIMM committee, immigration consultants and lawyers have come up to talk about what disasters the transformation and digital process are in certain areas. They're saying that they can't upload documents, and when they do spend hours doing it, the system crashes.

The minister, I'm sure, is aware of all of this. Is this what we bought with $24.8 million?


Sean Fraser Central Nova, NS
Liberal

I would suggest that we're in the middle of a major transition, and the system we're working with now is predominantly the legacy system GCMS that the department uses rather than a fully modernized system, which will be available and fine-tuned after a few years. I think it's important that we continue to work with those stakeholders to understand where there are gaps to be improved and then work to improve them.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
Liberal

Thank you, Minister. 


The Chair Kelly McCauley
Conservative

That's our time.


Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I appreciate that it's a new system, but the reality is that it's not working very well. If McKinsey was spearheading this with $24.8 million in tax dollars, it's not a very good job. I have to say that.

Can the minister advise if McKinsey—


The Chair Kelly McCauley
Conservative

I'm sorry, Ms. Kwan. I'm afraid that is your time. You will have one more two and a half minute round after this.

We now go over to Mrs. Block, please, for five minutes.
https://openparliament.ca/committees/government-operations/44-1/53/jenny-kwan-1/

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CIMM#115: Pension Transferability and Access to Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF), and Delays in Permanent Residence and Visas for Hong Kongers Recent Reforms to the International Student Program

James McNamee, Director General, Family and Social Immigration Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
I would say that's generally the case. If the work permit they obtained was originally connected to the public policy, that's correct. I don't know if that's the situation in all cases. In some cases, applicants may have had an LMIA-based work permit to begin with.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC, NDP
That's right. However, under the special immigration measure, the LMIA is not required.  I have a list of applicants in those circumstances. Their work permit renewal application was rejected. They were asked to submit an LMIA, which makes no sense. I want to flag that as a deep concern now emerging for people whose open work permits are being rejected as they wait for their permanent resident status. At this rate, given the immigration levels plan numbers and the processing delays happening, and with the number of applicants in place, you can imagine that it's going to take something like eight years to get through the backlog of people getting their PR status. This means that if they are trying to get their pension, they will not be able to do so for eight years, because they are required to provide proof of permanent residence.
I want to flag this as a major concern. I hope the department will take action to fix the error being applied to applicants whose open work permits are being rejected under this stream.  Can I get a confirmation from officials that this will be undertaken?

James McNamee, Director General, Family and Social Immigration Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
Yes, that issue has been raised with the department already, and we're looking into it to see what exactly happened in those situations.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC, NDP
Okay. Officials are aware of it, and yet it's still happening.  I have cases coming to me that are happening. I'm about to prepare a giant pile of this stuff for the minister, so I hope the officials will fix that.  The other thing related to the pension, of course, is lengthy delays for people to get their permanent status.  Based on the immigration levels plan and the number of applicants in place, is it the officials' anticipation that it will take about eight years to get those applications processed?

James McNamee, Director General, Family and Social Immigration Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
We have looked at that possibility. Certainly, it will take longer than we had previously indicated to the committee. I would note that the first year of the levels plan is the fixed year. The years that follow, in this case, 2026 and 2027, are flexible. There are opportunities to adjust those numbers in the future, and that could affect that timeline. It's hard to say whether eight years will be the timeline, but it will be longer than had been originally predicted because the numbers have gone down.

CIMM#114: Recent Reforms to the International Student Program

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
Aside from looking at patterns of potential violators—the groups and organizations taking advantage of students with these fraudulent letters of acceptance—will you be including in the analysis what types of institutions are being utilized for these fraudulent letters? In other words, is it private institutions versus public institutions, colleges versus universities and so on? Will that be part of the analysis?

Bronwyn MayDirector General, International Students Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
It's not always the case that a letter originates from an institution. We would need to look at various possible sources.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
Maybe I can reframe that.
Obviously, as these are fraudulent letters of acceptance, they wouldn't be issued by the institutions. However, regarding the list of institutions being used for the purpose of these fraudulent letters, I would be interested in obtaining information to determine what percentage are private institutions and public institutions, how many of them are colleges, how many of them are universities and so on. That will tell us very specific information that I think is important when trying to tackle fraudulent activities.

Bronwyn May, Director General, International Students Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
I completely agree. That's a very important line of analysis.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
I will make the further request to make sure you share this information with the committee. I'll argue that this information should not be kept secret. It should be public and transparent—shared with all Canadians—so that we're aware of what the landscape is and of how international students are being taken advantage of. With respect to that analysis, will there be information and data on what countries are being targeted?

Click to read the full discussion from the Committee meeting

CIMM#113: Pension Transferability and Access to Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF), and Delays in Permanent Residence and Visas for Hong Kongers

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
All right. Thank you.
Hence, we have this problem. You have the Canadian government, which created this lifeboat scheme for Hong Kongers who are fleeing persecution in Hong Kong as a result of the national security law. The government, in its wisdom or lack thereof, created this lifeboat scheme that only provides for temporary residence by way of a work permit or a study permit. Then these people have to go to the queue to make an application for permanent residence, and we know that there is a huge backlog and delay in processing.
In the beginning, there was swift action, but as time has passed, it's been lengthened by way of the delay, to the point where the former minister even made an announcement to further extend people's work permits and study permits for another three years. That is to say, a person could be here for six years—as long as six years—under this current scheme without getting permanent residence. This is because the minister anticipated that people would not be able to swiftly get their permanent resident status. That is the reality.
As a result of that, people are not able to provide proof of permanent residence, because the application is in process. To make it even worse, the government—the minister—just made an announcement about the levels plan, cutting levels to the tune of 105,000 permanent resident status applications.
You can imagine how long the wait-list is for Hong Kongers as they continue to wait. Now, these Hong Kongers have zero intention of returning to Hong Kong, because they know that they would be persecuted if they did. People know that. I think the Canadian government knows that.
This is my question, then, to you as the manager of their pension, which, because of this rule, they're unable to access: Would your organization be willing to write to the regulator to ask for consideration for these applicants who are in a prolonged period of waiting for permanent resident status, to ask that their declaration indicating that they do not intend to return to Hong Kong be accepted as proof that they intend to leave Hong Kong permanently so that they can access their pensions? Is that something that your organization would consider doing?

Maryscott GreenwoodGlobal Head, Government Relations, The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company
I think I understand the question.
The basic premise of your question has to do with the period of time it takes for the Government of Canada to determine and provide permanent residency or citizenship. It seems to me that this is a function of the Government of Canada, as opposed to a regulated entity. That's how I would answer that.

Laura HewittSenior Vice-President and Head, Global Government Affairs and Public Policy, Sun Life Financial Services of Canada Inc.
Yes. I would say that it's not within our authority to change the criteria.
However, our numbers show that once that permanent residency does come through, we're able to process the applications and approve Canadian permanent residents.

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