OGGO Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Monday, May 12, 2003

Á

1105

The Chair (Mr. Reg Alcock (Winnipeg South, Lib.))

Ms. Michelle d'Auray (Chief Information Officer, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat)

Á

1110

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey (Assistant Deputy Minister, Acquisition Program Branch, Department of Public Works and Government Services)

Á

1120

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Dr. David Fransen (Assistant Deputy Minister, Industry Sector, Department of Industry)

Á

1125

The Chair

Dr. David Fransen

The Chair

Dr. David Fransen

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist (Director General, Trade Commissioner Service Overseas Programs and Services, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade)

Á

1130

Á

1135

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Mr. Paul Forseth (New Westminster—Coquitlam—Burnaby, Canadian Alliance)

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Paul Forseth

Á

1140

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

Dr. David Fransen

Á

1145

Mr. Paul Forseth

The Chair

Mr. Robert Lanctôt (Châteauguay, BQ)

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Á

1150

Dr. David Fransen

The Chair

M. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Ms. Judy Sgro (York West, Lib.)

Á

1155

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

Ms. Judy Sgro

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Ms. Judy Sgro

Mr. Glen Bailey

Â

1200

The Chair

Mr. Roy Cullen (Etobicoke North, Lib.)

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Â

1205

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Dr. David Fransen

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Paul Forseth

Â

1210

Dr. David Fransen

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Mr. Paul Forseth

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Â

1215

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

The Chair

Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.)

Â

1220

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.)

Mr. Ken Sunquist

Â

1225

Mr. Paul Szabo

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Â

1230

Dr. David Fransen

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Ken Sunquist

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Â

1235

Mr. Roy Cullen

The Chair

Mr. Paul Forseth

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Mr. Roy Cullen

Â

1240

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

Mr. Roy Cullen

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Â

1245

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Mme Michelle d'Auray

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

Â

1250

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

Mr. Robert Lanctôt

The Chair

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Mr. Glen Bailey

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

Ms. Michelle d'Auray

The Chair

---

CANADA

Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates

---

NUMBER 039

l

2nd SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

---

EVIDENCE

Monday, May 12, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Á  (1105)  

[English]

    The Chair (Mr. Reg Alcock (Winnipeg South, Lib.)): Let us come to order.

    Let me position this meeting in the minds of everybody because we have been bouncing back and forth between estimates and clause-by-clause. This is meeting number 39 of the committee, and this is to inquire into the issue of online procurement and contract matching, the whole business of matching businesses with requests for service or supply.

    For the benefit of the witnesses, this committee has a couple of powers granted in the Standing Orders that are different from those granted other committees. One of them is that we have a specific responsibility for government use of information and communication technology government-wide. We also have responsibility for what are commonly called horizontal issues, which are issues that affect more than one department or that go across the breadth of departments.

    In response to some information that had been brought forward, we thought that in doing this round of estimates we would look at the tools for matching demand with suppliers. Having been informed that there were at least four areas in government that did some of this, we wanted to get a sense of the similarities and differences across the various platforms and why it was necessary to have four.

    We have asked Madam d'Auray to come simply because she is the CIO in charge of the world.

    We felt that having heard from the three of you, some clarity would be brought to this issue. We also thought that it would be better to bring you all to the table at once so that we don't have to keep bringing people back.

    As a result of today's meeting, we will make a decision as to whether we wish to go further or our curiosity is satisfied.

    Perhaps we could begin by having each one of you make a brief opening comment on the service that your particular department provides and give us some sense of the orders of magnitude. We'd be interested, I'm sure, in some of the costs and, if it's currently in operation, the magnitude of the client load. Perhaps you could keep your opening remarks relatively brief, and then we'll let members get into it and see where we end up.

    I was going to have you go last, but if you are eager to start off, much as I hesitate to allow this to happen because saving you for last allows me to hear everybody else first and then I can argue with you, rather than have you just tell me everything is okay....

    Madam d'Auray.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray (Chief Information Officer, Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    I will be extremely brief. We have copies of the presentation we will be speaking to for the members. We will be speaking to some components.

    I am accompanied by Mr. Glen Bailey, who is the Assistant Deputy Minister, Acquisition Program Branch in Public Works and Government Services Canada; David Fransen, the Assistant Deputy Minister for the Industry Sector at Industry Canada; and Ken Sunquist, director general, trade commissioner service overseas programsand services, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

    I'm actually going to be speaking to the second slide. In the government we're using electronic systems to meet procurement needs for essentially two major purposes: the first is to meet the procurement requirements and contracting opportunities for the Government of Canada; that is, to provide goods and services to the Canadian government. My colleague Mr. Bailey will be speaking to that. The second is to grow Canadian business and provide opportunities for Canadian business and exporters to find market opportunities both domestically and internationally. My two colleagues will be speaking to those. That's the distinction that primarily underlies the sets of services that are provided today. The Business Gateway is basically an entry point by which Canadian and other companies can find access to those two primary purposes or services: providing goods and services to the government and business opportunities domestically and internationally.

    Now I will turn to my colleagues.

Á  (1110)  

    The Chair: Have you decided on an order amongst yourselves?

    Mr. Glen Bailey (Assistant Deputy Minister, Acquisition Program Branch, Department of Public Works and Government Services): My name is Glen Bailey, and I'll be going next. I'll talk to you about the programs of the Department of Public Works and Government Services.

    I want to talk to you about where we're going in terms of the e-contracting services of the department and also the Government of Canada. Essentially, we provide the contracting service for all government programs and operations, which also includes the possibility of the identification of government-to-business opportunities as part of the overall system. The program covers everything from paper clips to construction and complex weapons systems. It's integrated into the government online and e-government vision in terms of the future work we're doing, in particular with regard to the marketplace.

    There are three major components of what we do. One is what we call our information management systems, which are internal. It is our mechanism by which we manage the contracting process. It serves both the procurement done by us and for other departments. It allows us to create and manage the tender notices and solicitations. It allows us to manage the contracts and standing offers. For example, we have a system called ABE by which documents that are created internally are then forwarded to the MERX or tendering system. It is our information database for the department only. It is our customer information system. It does delivery and payment tracking. It has a special tool related to the construction industry and how we select firms on a rotating basis. It also has, for example, on the web the standard acquisition clauses and conditions. These are a number of the things we have, just to show you the complexity of some of the tools we need to be able to manage the magnitude of the contracting processes.

    The second service I want to talk to you about is the government electronic tendering service, which most of you think of as MERX. The present system is the MERX system, which is now operated by Mediagrif, after they took it over from the Bank of Montreal in December. It is in effect the electronic tendering system. It's required by our own policies for competition and transparency as well as to meet our obligations under international trade agreements. Companies must register in our supplier registration index, which is part of the Contracts Canada service. It then provides the tombstone information database. Companies can then download the offers that are available on MERX either on a one-off basis or through their monthly subscription. It is available to all, and it promotes the fairness and transparency in government contracting that I talked to you about earlier. It's an effective way to transmit bid documents. There is free Internet access in the sense that any company, registered or not, may get on the system and take a look at the abstracts that are available and determine whether or not they are interested in particular bid documentation or solicitation. It is also connected with eight provinces that have various contractual or business arrangements with the MERX service.

    It is important to recognize that the system must withstand legal challenges. It must be able to ensure the accuracy of the information and the management of it. As you know, competitions that are on MERX may subsequently be subject to a challenge before the CITT, so it's important we make sure that all the documentation, data, and history about what happened at a particular time and who got what amendment and when are properly and accordingly recorded.

    Last year 30,000 users downloaded their choice with regard to 12,655 tenders.

    We are in the process of looking at the GETS III service, which is a replacement for the existing service. The RFP was issued in January. The bids are presently being evaluated. The request for proposal was based on a supplier-pay model, but we also foresaw the possibility that it could be a hybrid or a Canada-pay model. This is contingent upon other decisions with regard to funding, which are not known now. But there is the option and the possibility that the contract could be based on a different funding model than was originally envisioned in the RFP.

    We welcome the links with other services, such as SourceCAN, Gateway, Contracts Canada, and the provincial governments, as ways of bringing more companies to the MERX offering. The more companies that are aware, the more it is possible that we have companies that are capable of supplying at a good price the service or goods to the government. Business Gateway provides a single access point to all the government services and information needed to start, run, and grow a business

    The third area I want to talk about is the Government of Canada marketplace. This is something we are developing. We have a small e-procurement tool called e-purchasing. At present 19 departments are using this tool. We conduct about $25 million worth of business a year on this. We are heading toward having a very large selection of commercially available goods in this e-marketplace. It would be for the whole of government. It would be integrated, and it would be designed in such a way that the rules for competition, openness, and transparency in international trade agreements are included on the site. For example, we envisage having on this site a permanent notice for a particular type of procurement so that companies could come on at any time and they would be able, we expect, to adjust their prices and/or their offerings and catalogues accordingly as market conditions and their own capabilities change. It would also be integrated through the government online security channel. For example, we would be using the acquisition credit card on the secure channel, respecting the privacy of information of companies or individuals as well as the financial information that might be included on that. This is presently in our request for proposals, which we are about to issue. We expect that it will be out in about another month's time. So we're getting fairly well along on this one, and we think it has good potential. We hope that our four lead departments, which include Public Works and Government Services, the RCMP, the Transportation Safety Board, and Transport Canada, will be operational on this system beginning in September 2004.

    I'll add one comment, and then I think it's time for me to stop. On the slide containing the fact section it says “Foreign businesses can compete”. It should say “Canadian businesses”. The concept we wanted to distinguish here is that under our obligations under the trade agreements the information on MERX is open to companies anywhere in the world that may wish to compete. That's in contrast to the other two services you'll hear about, whose objective is to grow Canadian business, because that's their particular mandate.

    I'll stop there, Mr. Chairman.

Á  (1120)  

    The Chair: Perhaps you could add the cost to subscribers and users.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: For the MERX system there is a variety of charges. Basically, there's the $29.95 monthly charge for a subscription. If they're not a subscriber, they have a $55 fee per download, in addition to which there are fees for accessing documents, whether electronic, paper, fax, or courier.

    I forgot to mention where we were going on GETS III. The RFP is out, and bids are presently being evaluated. We envisage that would be all electronic. We also envisage--and this is a major change--that people would be able to see the bid documents online, even though they may not be able to download them depending on the funding model. As I told you earlier, the funding model is still open to final consideration.

    The Chair: Do you have an estimate of the cost of GETS III, or is that still being processed?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: No, we're just doing the evaluations now. We'll probably have a better sense in a month or two.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Who's next?

    Dr. David Fransen (Assistant Deputy Minister, Industry Sector, Department of Industry): I am, Mr. Chair. I'm David Fransen from Industry Canada.

    I will be talking about SourceCAN. SourceCAN, as you know, is an electronic marketplace. It raises the awareness of Canadian companies about international opportunities and seeks to manage their products and services with the thousands of these opportunities that are posted daily by both domestic and foreign corporations and governments.

[Translation]

    SourceCAN is the result of a partnership between Industry Canada, the Canadian Commercial Corporation and HyperNet. Its mandate is to facilitate business and to provide small and medium Canadian enterprises the opportunity to compete in the global marketplace.

[English]

    SourceCAN features the following: an up-to-date database of Canadian companies called Canadian Company Capabilities, domestic and international business opportunities, filtering for Canadian eligibility, an advisory service, feeds to other e-business websites, a business opportunity matching service, a virtual trade show, a partnering platform, posting of opportunities online, a broadband marketplace for Canadian communities, express marketplace, business services, news and finance, and a help file.

    SourceCAN offers eight tender feeds or sets of business opportunities that come from various governments and entities within its bid-matching system: Canadian bids; Nova Scotia provincial tender notices; New Brunswick provincial tender notices; the U.S. trade opportunity program; Agriculture Opportunities, an American agri-business-related enterprise; the European Union's tenders electronic daily, or TED; business-to-business opportunities; and, finally, the United States government.

[Translation]

    In 2002, SourceCAN has provided Canadian companies with 98 495 unique business opportunities, including 32 651 domestic opportunities and 65 844 international opportunities.

Á  (1125)  

[English]

    SourceCAN's bid-matching system matched the 98,495 unique opportunities with the profiles of Canadian companies. These opportunities were delivered directly to the desktop of potential Canadian respondents.

[Translation]

    In 2002, Canadian companies posted on the SourceCAN site 47 partnership opportunities which were matched with 246 potential partners.

[English]

    There are five classes of registrants or client groups within SourceCAN. These are: Canadian companies, contacts within Canadian companies, foreign companies, Canadian communities, and Canadian government employees, each with their own unique access rights.

[Translation]

    By the end of 2002, SourceCAN had 30 696 registered users, a figure which included 320 foreign businesses.

[English]

    The SourceCAN website features a user's guide, frequently asked questions, an extensive help file, and a glossary of terms. SourceCAN also offers a 1-800 number to users and publishes a periodic newsletter.

[Translation]

    SourceCAN and its partners, Canadian Commercial Corporation and HyperNet, operate at a very high standard of support services to their clients, with a client information request tracking system that generally provides answers within 24 hours.

[English]

    In 2002 SourceCAN helped New Brunswick build the SourceNB website, which is modelled on SourceCAN but specifically targeted to the business clientele in New Brunswick. Other provinces have expressed an interest in establishing similar sites.

[Translation]

    SourceCAN cooperated with a number of provincial governments in order to establish a harmonized provincial tendering system and to encourage adoption of e-commerce throughout the country.

[English]

    During 2002 SourceCAN received positive feedback from members, industry reps, and other users. It was awarded by a panel of federal, provincial, and municipal judges a silver medal at GTEC in the enabling e-government category.

[Translation]

    The update controller of the Canadian Business Network database within Industry Canada, the main source of information for SourceCAN, shows that out of 55 000 registered businesses, 86% have already updated their information over the last 18 months.

[English]

    SourceCAN is committed to a variety of activities in the near future. Those include the addition of new feeds, which provide new opportunities for tendering; the introduction of more multilingual capabilities; the implementation of an improved client-centric registration system; a marketing campaign; and the formation of additional partnerships.

    I'll turn it over to my colleague from Foreign Affairs.

    The Chair: Just before you do, can you answer the same question in terms of cost to subscribers and users?

    Dr. David Fransen: It's zero cost to subscribers. The annual operating costs are approximately $700,000.

    The Chair: They're within the Industry portfolio.

    Dr. David Fransen: Yes.

    The Chair: I'll come back to PWGSC for that same question on the costs associated with MERX. We don't want stuff on GETS. I understand that we'll keep that off the table.

    Let's do IBOC next. That same question is there about the cost to users and the cost of operations.

    Mr. Ken Sunquist (Director General, Trade Commissioner Service Overseas Programs and Services, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade): My name is Ken Sunquist. I'm the director general of the trade commissioner service of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

    Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity.

    I'll just take a few moments to describe how IBOC is complementary to other e-government initiatives.

    I'll talk a little bit about the strengths of IBOC and its unique approach to assisting the private sector. That approach is really around a personalized commercial intelligence service on international opportunities, rather than general information.

    IBOC was derived as an initiative from a memo to cabinet on Canada's international business development strategy. It addresses the need for Canada to increase its capacity to search out and engage Canadian firms on international business leads, including trade, technology, and investment. It is the sourcing centre for Team Canada Inc. Team Canada Inc. is 22 government departments and agencies and is co-chaired by the deputy ministers of trade and Industry Canada. It has horizontal governance throughout. It is jointly staffed and funded by DFAIT and Industry Canada in partnership with Agriculture Canada. It's the only institution under Team Canada Inc. that has employees from all three departments working in one group and funded by it. So in some ways it really is a success story of horizontal governance.

    The goals and objectives are very clear. It's more exporters in more sectors and in more markets. The business model is built on recognition of the need for person-to-person service, especially if you're trying to bring in small and medium-sized companies that are new to the market or new exporters.

    We have 500 trade commissioners in 140 posts around the world. As part of their regular job, they come across opportunities that are not yet public. If they know that the company is active in the market, they feed those opportunities electronically through what is called our virtual trade commissioner directly to the companies. If they do not have a company that's operating in that market, they contact IBOC. IBOC then takes it on. They telephone individual companies to ascertain whether they have a capability and whether they're interested, and they work through the process of getting them into a new market. It may be a company that's already exporting. It may be a company that's active in another market close to the region. So that's how it brings it together.

    The referral situation is very important here. If the company hasn't been in China before, how do they get into the market? What steps do they take? So the referral service goes back to the business service centres of Industry Canada or the international trade centres across Canada, Export Development Corporation in their regional offices, Agriculture Canada, the Canadian Commercial Corporation, whatever the need would be. They refer them back and make sure that they're export ready and export capable instead of sending them on a chase. This is the important part for us. It's a qualified lead where our trade commissioner says that there's an opportunity and somebody else doesn't already have the bid.

    IBOC uses extensive electronic databases to find these companies. First of all, there's the virtual trade commissioner, with about 20,000 companies that are currently exporters. There's Canadian Company Capabilities, which has previously been discussed. This is about 50,000 companies listed in Industry Canada's database. We use Agriculture and the provinces across Canada. So if you get a request for a product in a country, we can find several companies that might be able to handle it. Basically, we've handled about 30,000 vetted leads and delivered them to Canadian companies. It's based on competitive intelligence.

    I have outlined the value-added services. Specific leads are what we call solid leads with high potential for sale or contract, where a short list of qualified Canadian companies is contacted by phone to determine their interest. It's treated as business intelligence as opposed to business information. It's not for general distribution. So you have the Trade Commissioner Service, IBOC, and Team Canada, whichever department is involved, facilitating the matchmaking process. We have general leads, which lack specific information, and companies are not always contacted by phone on this one. We have another service, which really cements sales. Very often foreign companies will ask for the bona fides of a Canadian company.So we handle things such as Dunn and Bradstreet reports for the foreign companies so that they can feel that they have a good Canadian company.

Á  (1130)  

    We do proactive sourcing. For instance, the trade officer in Mexico may look at the chemicals market and see who's supplying it now. Then we would try to do import substitution, using that as a way to get into that market. We also use it as a recruitment list for trade shows and missions.

    The second slide shows the types of things that happen. We have contracts in a variety of countries, both developed and developing, in a variety of industry sectors. They would not have taken place if somebody hadn't brought it to their attention. The examples shown there go from $54,000 for fibre optic cable to $4 million for geological consulting. They're quite different types of leads. Most of them are SMEs, typically first-ever sales or new-to-market sales. We track and record all business activity.

    Recently, Industry Canada and DFAIT had an evaluation and review. We've confirmed that IBOC is doing what it is mandated to do and doing it well. We've also found that on average the leads were sent to one or two companies. The majority of leads have resulted in negotiations between a Canadian exporter and the company contacted. Canadian exporters most often report the contact with a foreign buyer, and about 80% of the time they follow up. A substantial number of trade leads result in the submission of samples to buyers or contacts with trade officers. Even when a contract isn't made right now, at least it's a good contact for the future.

    Where I should end is that the minister's small and medium-sized advisory board has reviewed IBOC's operations and has confirmed that it's industry's preference for specific leads. That's our vision as to how we can progress and move more and more companies into the export market.

    With regard to the two questions you asked earlier, I think I've answered the one on horizontal management. On the magnitude, there were 30,000 specific leads. The reference level operating costs are about $200,000 per year. But, as you can see, this is very labour intensive. We have 24 sourcing officers involved in IBOC, and the cost of salaries is about $1.2 million.

    I believe that answers most of the questions you asked, Mr. Chair.

Á  (1135)  

    The Chair: Was it $1.2 million?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: Yes, and $200,000--

    The Chair: I thought you said $1.2 billion. I know you pay the upper end, but I didn't realize it was quite that order of magnitude.

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: I wish.

    The Chair: I have one final comment for Madam d'Auray, which can be answered later. Then I'm going to go to Mr. Forseth.

    Is this it? Is this the full range? There aren't others of these in Agriculture or some other place to the best of your knowledge.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: In terms of the procuring for the government, as far as we know, those are it. That's why I make the distinction between serving the government's needs for procurement purposes, providing goods and services for the government, and the growing of business opportunities. We've tried to show that there is a difference. There are probably others in terms of export development, as my colleagues have mentioned. Some departments will grow their own areas. For example, Agriculture will spend a fair amount of time with their providers, the agrifood industry, for example, to develop export opportunities. But in terms of supplying to the government, these would be it.

    The Chair: Mr. Forseth.

    Mr. Paul Forseth (New Westminster—Coquitlam—Burnaby, Canadian Alliance): Thank you.

    Thank you for coming today.

    In the first part of the presentation I picked up a comment related to the construction industry, I think it was. It was that there would be a selection of firms on a rotating basis. That sounds like waiting around till it's my turn, instead of winning a bid. Can you help me with that?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: This is a system we've worked out with the Construction Association. It identifies the companies at various levels, depending on the characteristics of that particular bid, etc., to be able to match possible suppliers. It's not waiting around for your turn. I may have to get some additional information, but the idea is that we worked it out with the Construction Association in order to be able to identify companies, because construction contracts can be for many different types of skills and skill sets as well as different regions and those kinds of things.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: I want more information on that. I'm not happy with that answer. I get nervous when I hear, we've worked out a deal, because that seems to fly against an open market. Maybe we can get some more information in that regard.

    Looking at the International Business Opportunities Centre, can an average Canadian go on the Internet and look at all the companies listed as to what they want potentially to export? It's another form of advertising, I suppose. You're talking about listing all these companies, and there must be some description as to what they believe they can deliver to the markets around the world. Can the average Canadian just go on that site and look at all of that?

Á  (1140)  

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: The short answer is no. The way it operates is that companies that wish to be registered in the virtual trade commissioner do so via the Business Gateway or directly. Companies and individuals can get into the system and find those that are listed in our virtual trade commissioner or on InfoExport, the website. So they can get most of the information, but they cannot check to see whether their competitors are in fact chasing a deal in another country, which I think is probably what you're getting at there.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: Not really. Why can't I go home and get on the Internet and see who's listed as potential exporters and what their little flag is as to the kind of stuff they are capable of selling?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: Canadian companies have two ways of registering. If it's through the Canadian Company Capabilities guide under Industry Canada, they would list what their capabilities are. Under both the Canadian Company Capabilities and the virtual trade commissioner they get to pick which markets they're interested in. We hold that information as confidential for their purposes as to where they're active and where they'd like to be active. So that database is not publicly accessible.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: So who gets to see it, then? What's the point of having a database if no one can get into it?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: The database is used by the international trade centres across Canada and the government business service centres. If they found that they had a potential opportunity in China, they would search the companies in that sector interested in China. They would then approach those companies to see whether they're interested in actually pursuing it.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: Do you have any qualifications as to who can get on that list? For instance, since business is as complex as it is, a Canadian firm may be selling a variety of products and a lot of them may not be Canadian made. They may have a variety of products that are imported. They may reconfigure it. They may use components from all over the world and then produce a Canadian product out the door. Let's say that they're going to provide a complicated communications system for a building complex. They may have Canadian parts, and they may have foreign parts. Is there a qualification that it must it be all Canadian? What's the deal there?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: That's a good question. One of the filters of getting listed on the system is what your product is and whether it's a Canadian company. We take a look at it, and a value decision is made. It's always done with the company. We work with the company. That is why we have personalized contact with them. We say, where's the product coming from? Are you bidding from Canada, or are you a multinational bidder from somewhere else? That would have a direct impact on whether they'd be receiving the lead.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: So again it's another worry flag. As soon as we get into value decisions we have to say, who decides and on what basis and what criteria? Is that--

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: We can provide the details on that to you, sir.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: Okay.

    Dr. David Fransen: The company profiles on SourceCAN are available to individual Canadians. That's one way in which we are complementary to the system that IBOC has established.Those company profiles are vetted to ensure the quality of information.

Á  (1145)  

    Mr. Paul Forseth: I'll have to wait until the second round.

    The Chair: Mr. Lanctôt.

[Translation]

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt (Châteauguay, BQ): Mr. Chairman, before asking my questions, I have one comment to make. First of all, I would like to congratulate David Fransen for having made his presentation in both official languages. It shows great respect to members around the table and I want to commend him for it because I believe that all four witnesses are being paid a bonus for bilingualism. Of course, we have simultaneous translation here, but it is tiresome to always have to listen to the translation and it is good to get the French directly. So this is a comment I wanted to make. Congratulations, Mr. Fransen.

    When you have in a database like IBOC two, three, four or 10 companies listed, who makes the choice? Is the business lead being sent to all companies that are able to deliver or that have the required skills and so on? Do they all receive the information or does a departmental official decide which companies gets it?

[English]

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: Merci, monsieur.

    I think there are several different replies to your question. The first one is that we search the databases.

[Translation]

    Is something wrong?

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: You may not have understood my initial comment, but it does not matter. Did you understand my comment? It does not show.

[English]

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: Oui. The response is that we have a list of all of the companies that are interested. We contact them to ascertain their interest. We usually go forward with about two or three of those most interested in a project. Many companies will describe themselves as being interested in a sector worldwide, but when we tell them that it's Senegal or China, for example, they may voluntarily withdraw.

[Translation]

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: I would like to know the process from the beginning to the end. Your officers abroad come up with a lead and you communicate with the companies? I would like to know the process from beginning to end. How does a given company get chosen? Somebody is making the choice. Who does?

[English]

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: The choice is ultimately up to the company as to whether or not they wish to pursue the opportunity. If I were to take the whole process, what we're really talking about is the intelligence gathered at a mission abroad and communicated back here. We're searching any database available to find companies that might meet that need and then discussing it with those companies to see whether the market is the right one for them. Normally, we hope that there is not a huge number, for the simple reason that if we have--I don't know what the number would be--a large number seeking the same opportunity, then Canadian companies knock each other out of the competition. But we do talk to them and try to see who is best suited for it. In the end, if a Canadian company wishes to pursue an opportunity, we're there to help them.

[Translation]

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: Is there any overlap? There is IBOC doing that work, there is SourceCAN, we have several programs. So I wonder if there are several organizations doing the same thing? Is there any duplication or overlap? Could we not have just one organization to do the follow-up, especially at the international level? I would like to hear your comments.

Á  (1150)  

    Dr. David Fransen: With regards to the international situation, when we talk about international opportunities, we must be aware of a difference between the two systems. There is a variation that is not insignificant.

    The system described by Mr. Sunquist is based on intelligence provided by people. SourceCAN is based on public systems, the opportunities published on MERX for Canadian procurement and abroad on the systems of the European Union, the United States and others, and in those cases, the information is available on the Internet.

    You started by asking who makes the choice. With regards to the public systems and the SourceCAN system, there are two initial filters in the process. There is a first filter, as described this morning, a pre-server, which is an assessment by officials of the Canadian Commercial Corporation who remove those opportunities from which Canadian companies are excluded because of foreign government conditions.

    Next, the opportunities are entered into the system and there is a second filter which is established by the companies themselves. When they create their profile in the system, they state what sort of business they are after and they receive only those matching opportunities. Therefore, the choice is made by the companies themselves in a way.

    But the IBOC system is at an entirely different level. These leads are about foreign companies that do not necessarily publish their tenders on any public system or who talk with our agents before posting them in order to give us a chance to discuss with them.

[English]

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Forseth.

    Glen Bailey, you want to make a brief intervention here.

[Translation]

    M. Glen Bailey: This is just to make the distinction and this takes us back to the distinction made by Ms. d'Auray in the beginning. It means that we have two programs: that of Industry Canada and that of Foreign Affairs, both of which are for business opportunities in Canada or abroad.

    The system that we manage deals with all procurement of the Government of Canada and supports all operations and programs of the government. It is a means to better deliver government programs, which brings with it a whole different range of needs and controls. So I do not see any overlap. It is just that with MERX you need to be registered in order to access the opportunities that are posted but everything is included and required for the operation of MERX. But the range is much wider than that.

[English]

    The Chair: Thank you, Monsieur Lanctôt.

    Next is Madam Sgro.

    Ms. Judy Sgro (York West, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

    Welcome. I'm glad to have you here.

    On the issue of coordination and horizontality, which we've been trying to look at even more so lately, it's good to see you folks attempting to do that. Do you think it's reasonable to say that within the next several years we will be able to bring other departments into the coordinated area that you're trying to do when it comes to a variety of these communication vehicles? Are the other departments prepared to start working in a coordinated fashion on some of these things?

Á  (1155)  

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: Perhaps I can answer that. On the two fronts, both the Government of Canada opportunities and the opportunities in both the domestic and international marketplace, if you look at the partners under each of the sets of systems, the Team Canada partners are 22 departments and agencies and SourceCAN has quite a few partners, as does the Government of Canada. It offers a procurement service for the whole of government. So the partnerships are there. The purposes, however, are different. I think that's the underlying factor. But the horizontality and the working together are embedded in all of the approaches that are before you today.

    Ms. Judy Sgro: For the different companies that attempt to access opportunities within Canada and abroad, do the IBOC officers just respond when they have an inquiry, or are they out there actively promoting Canadian businesses abroad?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: The officers abroad are in fact part of the trade commissioner service, and day in and day out that is their job. They communicate that information back to Canadian companies here. That's the nature of how you get success.

    I talked about the proactive part. We take a sector in Germany, Mexico, or wherever and look at who the current exporters are from France, Germany, and Australia and try to see if we could displace them. That's where IBOC would play a large role in actually dealing with the sector officers across Canada in trying to come up with new companies that could fit into those.

    I think the issue here is that we're actually doing matchmaking. Our trade officers abroad and IBOC are putting businesses together. We get the information from the business overseas and communicate it to a Canadian company and get them in contact with each other. We're vouching for it, in a sense, because our trade commissioner abroad is saying that these are serious opportunities, and on the other hand we're saying that these are serious Canadian companies that want to do the business. So we're putting it together, along with dealing with the bona fides or other issues where in fact the foreign companies want to know the value of the Canadian company and how well they are doing, instead of us just pushing any company over there. So the answer to your question is that on a daily basis both our trade commissioners abroad and our IBOC sourcing officers here are doing that.

    As I said, one of our subsets is growing companies in the international opportunities. But it's also trying to develop new exporters and new-to-market exporters. If you take a good company that's exporting to the northern U.S., maybe they should be looking farther afield to Mexico. If they were already competitive in North America, should they be looking at Europe or Asia? In a normal tendering situation--and this is where we're complementary to the SourceCAN site--companies will stick with their markets, where they're known and have a good chance of success. We try to bring them into new markets and further exploit their abilities.

    Ms. Judy Sgro: With regard to the issue of cost recovery, which we often talk about, what are you doing to try to reduce those costs so that more people are getting involved in putting in requests and so on, rather than the costs being prohibitive to some in the sense of why they would bother because they have to put out more than just who's interested? How do you get on the list so that companies know that there are opportunities there? That's aside from the issue of the construction, which I expect you'll want to clarify.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: In terms of costs, we're awaiting the results of the present RFP for GETS III. One of the key principles we have enunciated is that we'll be looking for an all-electronic system. A good portion of the costs that are presently associated with the MERX system falls on the fact that not everything is available electronically. Then we have the distribution systems for fax, courier, mail, all those kinds of things, and that adds to the number of different distribution channels themselves and makes it more complicated. Also, they're more labour intensive. So our expectation is that with the new contract, it will be an all-electronic system.

    You asked a question earlier about horizontality. The MERX service serves all government departments. The GETS is there for all government departments. It's not just for contracts that come. So it is horizontal and inclusive.

    Finally, on the marketplace, I mentioned that we had four lead departments, but we have forty-four departments that are participating in our regular interdepartmental meetings. So again, this will be a fully integrated approach across government.

    You gave me an opportunity to come back to Mr. Forseth's question. This rotation mechanism is only for contracts under $100,000. The system provides a number of different things, as I've indicated, with regard to matching the services, region, type of business, and what you're qualified for. You don't rotate and have just one company pop up. Five companies are invited to bid, so there is a competition around it. It is based on very small contracts and only where there is a defined region or location of business, construction being, of course, very sensitive in many cases to where the activity is taking place and where the company is located.

  (1200)  

    The Chair: Thank you, Madam Sgro.

    We'll move to Mr. Cullen.

    Mr. Roy Cullen (Etobicoke North, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Thank you to the witnesses.

    I'm sorry I missed your presentations. I have a couple of questions. If it becomes repetitive, I apologize in advance.

    I have a company in my riding that a group of women entrepreneurs, Somali refugees, started. They basically sew pieces together into garments. They started out with a few sewing machines, which were donated by Singer or some other company, and now it has grown into a fairly good-sized business.

    The MERX now costs how much per month to subscribe to?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: It's $30.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: How much did it used to be?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: It used to be $5.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: It was $5 a month. I introduced them to MERX, and then the price went up. It's unaffordable for them, frankly, as it is for many small businesses in Canada. I think you've probably heard from the CFIB on that score. I'd like to come back to the whole process of fee setting. I'm trying to help this young company. They want to access government procurement. Right now they're subbing on bids, and they want to go direct; for instance, to Correctional Service Canada and provincial institutions. They're making all kinds of garments, blankets, pillow cases, all that kind of stuff.

    One of my colleagues, Sarmite Bulte, who is chairing the Task Force on Women Entrepreneurs, came out to my riding and met with them. She said, hang on, you don't need the MERX. You can use this other system, SourceCAN. So I got all of the material and shipped it out to them. Unfortunately, this only happened recently, and I haven't been able to check it out.

    What additional value do they get for $30 a month? SourceCAN is free, is it not, through the Industry Canada website? What is the value added for $30 a month? That's the bottom line.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: With MERX you can do the same as you can with SourceCAN. You can search the abstracts, which SourceCAN allows you to do. You can see the business opportunities there, and you can then determine whether one is of interest to you. Whether you're in SourceCAN or MERX, if the business opportunity is one of interest to you, you still have to buy the bid documents. So whether you see it there or directly from MERX, that's where you're going to be led to.

    You have two options. One is the monthly subscription, which is $30. If you choose that, then you don't have the one-time fee of $55 every time you download a particular opportunity. So it really depends on how often you think you might be looking at bids. There is the opportunity for people to determine whether or not they want to. So the advantage of the $30 is that you avoid that fee on a one-off basis.

  (1205)  

    Mr. Roy Cullen: So with MERX you don't have to pay to get the bid documents.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: People would normally register with Contracts Canada. I wanted to mention Contracts Canada and the situation with the women entrepreneurs because one of the things that we've been--

    Mr. Roy Cullen: If I could just back up for a moment, so one of the significant differences is that with MERX, if you see an opportunity and you download the bid documents, you don't pay for that, whereas with SourceCAN you'd have to pay.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: You have to pay either way.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: I'm still waiting to hear about the big advantage of paying $30 a month.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: If you're not a monthly subscriber and you download, you pay $55 plus fees associated with how you received the particular documents, whether by fax, courier, or e-mail, per page. The average cost is around another $50 if you are doing a download, depending on the amount of information in the contract. Construction contracts, for example, can be quite lengthy. If you're paying the $30 a month fee, then you don't pay that $55.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: So if someone--

    Dr. David Fransen: A correction needs to be made here. Sorry to interrupt. On SourceCAN you cannot bid. It is not a vehicle for bidding. The information was incorrect in the sense that you can get all of that for free on SourceCAN. SourceCAN provides initial information about the types of contracts that are available upon which you can bid. But if you desire to actually get in and do the bidding, you need to go through MERX.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Do you mean bidding online or just bidding of any kind?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: Any kind. SourceCAN only provides information about an abstract.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: If you wanted to make garments for Correctional Service Canada, for example, how much of that would be on the system at any one point in time? Does it also have windows into other government procurement--provincial, municipal, and all that?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: The MERX system has abstracts for everything that's put on by the eight provinces that are part of the MERX system as well as the federal government opportunities that are put on the MERX system. About 12,600 per year are from the federal government.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: So it really comes down to a cost-benefit situation, how often you're going to bid and how many opportunities there might be. If you come across an opportunity under SourceCAN, then you could phone up the department and say, I want all the bid documents, and you're going to have to pay for that.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: You'd have to go to MERX.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Do you mean that you would have to go to MERX and start paying $30 a month to get the documents?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: No, you don't have to pay $30 a month. You can just take a one-time download. The service is provided for all of government. It's horizontal. It's a single point of contact. It might be useful to contact individual departments if you have identified several departments with whom you think there would be business. It might be useful for them to talk to the people there who are actually leading those individual procurement exercises.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Yes, just to make sure that they'd be in the ballpark. So good advice would be to try SourceCAN and see how many opportunities are there. If you get into a volume situation, you might be better off subscribing.

    The Chair: I understand that the one-time download cost is $105.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: There's a $55 fee, and then the cost could go from $65 to something higher depending on the number of pages, how complex the procurement documents are, etc.

    The Chair: Mr. Forseth.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: Thank you.

    Looking at all these potentials for export and listing and so on, are there private sector alternatives, such as industrial groups that form professional associations or associations of like-minded industries and do their own marketing? I'm wondering if you're competing against other organizations.

  (1210)  

    Dr. David Fransen: SourceCAN is working together with industry associations that are interested in that kind of business, so an act of collaboration is already underway. I believe the question was, are we competing with the private sector in the sense that there are alternative websites or entities out there that are trying to do the same thing? To my knowledge, the answer is no.

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: You asked if we are competing. No, we're not competing with the private sector, nor are we competing inside government. I think this is a key point. We try to make sure that the field is vacant, so to speak. We work with industry associations to see what sectors are priorities. We work with other government departments to make sure that we're doing something on a horizontal basis. I think that from what you've heard today, there's no sense of competition there. In fact, it's the opposite. It's very complementary as to how you build your different systems.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: You say that you're all complementary. I hope you're really making some effort in that regard. It does sound as if it's a somewhat similar activity, and yet you're divided under different heads. I'm wondering why you're not all together in one action.

    You obviously know that the government has promised up to $1 billion in reallocation of government spending in the ministries. In the budget speech it said that they would report to the country in early May. I'm wondering if you folks have done anything in the last while to defend your rationales and perhaps provide value-per-dollar reports. A lot of what you're talking about certainly sounds like “nice to haves”, but you know that there's always a great deal of pressure on government expenditure. You're going to have to ensure that you make the grade in comparison to other government priorities and demands on government spending.

    The question is, could your activities be done by the private sector? Maybe because you're there, you're crowding out what might become viable in the private sector. It relates somewhat to the earlier question.

    The Chair: Does someone want to make a brief response to that?

    Madam d'Auray.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: On the review, departments are looking at the value for some of the services for the first $1 billion as promised in the budget. But additional reviews are also starting, some of which are horizontal, looking at specific issues, and some of them are in fact department by department. So sets of these are currently going on.

    On the export side there is a constant assessment of whether we are getting value for money for the opportunities that are being developed. There is a continuum between a self-service model, which in large part SourceCan provides to Canadian companies, and a personalized service, which in a sense IBOC provides. Where there is a new market opportunity or a growing market opportunity and the sources of information are complementary, the databases are quite similar and are in fact integrated, and companies can select and work from that basis.

    In terms of working with the private sector--and this will be my final comment--a lot of discussions are ongoing--for example, with the Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters and the CFIB--to identify the priority areas to target. That then informs the investment decisions and/or the market opportunities that are found by the trade commissioners.

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Forseth.

    We'll see if there is another round. There may be time.

    Monsieur Lanctôt.

[Translation]

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    With all these information agencies, you gather financial information but also confidential information on companies registered in all these databases. Who manages the information that you collect? What is your program or process to ensure the security of this confidential information?

    On the other hand, as Quebeckers or Canadians or members of Parliament trying to get information we are always frustrated because there is always an exemption from access to information legislation that allows to withhold information about a private company we would like to have. I hope that in this committee we will review the Access to Information Act which has not been amended for a very long time because it is unacceptable that we cannot have access to information about procurement contracts between the government and private suppliers. How can we ensure citizens can find out the truth and get information and how can we do our job? I would like to hear you on these two parts of my question.

  (1215)  

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray With regards to the security of data and information provided by companies, as my colleague has emphasized, in some databanks the information is treated as confidential or privileged because it is financial or about business initiatives that the company wants to be kept confidential until they are made public. So this information is being protected. Only the company and, under certain circumstances, commissioners or trade officers who will work more directly with these companies will have access. This information is not released.

    However, there is a layer of information that is available to the general public such as the data bank of SourceCAN to which companies provide information because it is a public registry. So these data are available and the companies can write their own profile.

    As for contracts--and my colleague may want to add his own comments--bids submitted under a call for tender are confidential because an assessment process is required and once the contract has been assigned to one bidder, the information is returned to the companies because of competitive considerations.

    So there are three levels. There is the public level, where the company registers with SourceCAN; there is privileged information where companies state they are aiming at certain markets in a competitive environment--this information is not made public--and then there is the government procurement process where bids submitted or information provided is considered confidential because the assessment is done on a competitive basis.

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: I have more questions. Do I still have some time left?

[English]

    The Chair: We'll see if we have time for another round.

    Dr. Bennett.

    Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.): Thank you.

    As you know, our esteemed chair has been on a campaign for a long time around horizontality and purchasing.

    In terms of technology driving change, do you think that the technology is helping us know where we're buying things across all departments? Could some of the savings we're hoping for come about if all of the car leasing, IV tubing, and mattresses went to Correctional Service Canada? Across even the eight provinces and all government departments, how much ability is there to collaborate in terms of purchasing across government departments because of this? Are people asked if they would like to? How often on the MERX website would there be three different government departments asking for the same thing with slightly different criteria, which, with a little coordination, could make it more complementary so that they could get a better price if they got together? Is there that possibility in the government? What's the possibility that the government could then add some sort of environmental screen or some other ability to bring it together; for example, that all paper bought by the Canadian government has to have a certain amount of hemp so that it can be recycled more often? In terms of a horizontal approach, we should be able to get savings and have some say that the leased cars are all hybrids or something.

  (1220)  

    Mr. Glen Bailey: I think what you're articulating is where we're hoping to be able to go. We do some of those things now, but I think it would be fair to acknowledge that we don't do as much of it as we could. Yes, technology is going to be a big way for us to go forward.

    I talked about the Government of Canada marketplace in my introduction. This is essentially where the big opportunities are in the commercially available goods, which you talked about. By having a single marketplace, which is evergreen, we're hoping that we will be able to do a couple of things. One is capture the overall buy of the Government of Canada through a database that allows us to see much more accurately all of the buy and then figure out what kinds of price benefits we might be able to derive. People will have the opportunity to evergreen their pricing, and they'll see everybody else's prices. So when they see that one company is better positioned to get more contracts because their price is 10% higher, then they're in a position to lower their price and to do that fairly regularly or constantly. So we think that quite a bit of competition will be taking place on this mechanism.

    On green contracting, this is again what we're hoping to generate. We now have some standing offers and other purchasing mechanisms where we do include the green criterion. We want to be much more effective in using, for example, the eco logo, the energy star. We want to put up this tool so that people will be able to identify it. We are talking with departments about a couple of options: one, we could simply make it available to people to make it clear they have the choice; and, two, we could pop up the green option first or we could default them to a green option so that they would then have to make a conscious decision not to choose that particular product.

    So we're very much where we want to be going.

    The Chair: Thank you, Dr. Bennett.

    Mr. Szabo.

    Mr. Paul Szabo (Mississauga South, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

    Probably the most important indicator of success or productivity is what the customers are saying. We certainly heard a lot about how much you like your system, but we didn't have very much input on what people are saying about our systems. I'd be interested to know whether the users are prompted to provide feedback. Do we do external or third-party reviews or audits of the sites for people who are looking at it with an objective eye? Do we consciously go out and survey users or look for trends where people used to use, don't use, or whatever? As a result of doing all that work, if we do it, have we made a strategic assessment as to how well we're doing, and as a consequence of that strategic assessment, do we have any new plans on how to improve the service we provide?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: The answer is yes to just about everything you've said. It comes out of a question earlier about reviewing our expenditures and how that fits into departmental priorities. Industry Canada and Foreign Affairs have a third-party consultant, which is not responsible to us but to our audit teams, to investigate IBOC and look at where the trends are and what we should be doing better. And we will be moving on those issues. The issue really is around focus. The tendency is to start doing more things. What our clients want is a lot of focus on specific leads. So that's the route we're taking. We do have audits, and they are independent. The audits are all around our clients. That's the whole reason we exist. It's what the clients need.

    I hope that answers part of your question.

  (1225)  

    Mr. Paul Szabo: You do this information gathering. What have you been told? I'd be interested in the results in terms of the strategy direction.

    I've visited many of these sites. Although I'm not a direct user, I tried to assess it as to user friendliness, etc.Those are very awesome tools that are available there. I really am a little concerned about the non-sophisticated users, the small and medium-sized businesses. They just know how to do something--I have a service, a product, or whatever--but when it comes to how to get involved in the export thing or how to do government business, they don't have the internal expertise. So you're asking people who are operations oriented and not so much administrative and marketing to do this. How do we make sure that we haven't left those unsophisticated users out of the cycle?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: There are several parts to this. The audit and evaluation has recommended that we do more follow-up with our clients on a regular basis--three months, six months after we put them in contact with it--on what they got out of it. We follow up now with phone calls and electronically, but the audit has asked us to do a better job on that. The SME advisory board has taken the line you have just taken, that they want much more person-to-person counselling and that's how to get them into it. The larger the company, the less--“hand-holding” is too presumptive. The larger companies have vice-presidents of marketing and vice-presidents of business development. So what we're really looking at is how you give better service, in particular to SMEs, and that's around personal approach and follow-up, which the audit report has asked us to do more of.

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Szabo.

    Given the time we have left, I simply want to push a little harder on a couple of things.

    For the benefit of all members, I'd like to point someone out to you at the back of the room. Mr. Reid, I hate to out you, but would you raise your hand? If you ever want to learn anything about government procurement, you might book a half-hour with Mr. Reid and truly confuse yourself. It's a delightful expenditure of time.

    The complexity in government procurement is far greater than immediately meets the eye. So I understand some of that. I understand on the DFAIT side the difficulty with smaller companies where an offering overseas may be attractive. I've seen far too many small companies get hurt badly trying to access those markets. So I think this counselling process is important. Mr. Reid will tell you about the complexities of a simple thing like cycling the five people who are going to get the bid information. It's the cost. It's similar to the problem we have with hiring. Do you give equal processing of all requests for hiring when you have thousands and thousands of them? The cost of processing to provide equity is a big problem. I understand all that.

    At the same time it seems to me that there are some essential elements here. If I understand correctly, one needs a database of companies that are prepared to supply. IBOC uses the SourceCAN database. Did I understand that correctly? Yes or no.

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: No.

    The Chair: Oh, you don't. So you've built your own supplier database.

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: Canadian Company Capabilities, which is the larger Industry Canada database of about 50,000 companies, feeds in.... Both SourceCAN and ourselves would use--

    The Chair: Let me be really precise on this, please. Just give me a yes or a no or point me someplace else. Does SourceCAN have an independent database of suppliers?

  (1230)  

    Dr. David Fransen: SourceCAN's database would be made up of those companies that have come to SourceCAN and registered with SourceCAN. The larger database is a CCC database, which would include those that have come to SourceCAN plus those that have not. That's why you would see a difference between....

    The Chair: So there's a SourceCAN database and a MERX database. The SourceCAN database has about 36,000 suppliers, and MERX has 30,000.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: In the supplier registration index there are 63,000, and this is through Contracts Canada.

    The Chair: IBOC uses yet another one. Is that the CCC you're talking about?

    Mr. Ken Sunquist: There are about 20,000 registered exporters within CCC. That would be the base that comes out.

    The Chair: The question always is, while it's attractive to maintain these things separately, why is it not possible to have one? Why is it not possible to have one robust, well-maintained source of Canadian suppliers and the products they supply, rather than three, four, five, or whatever the number is? It's not uncommon for these things to begin separately, as this technology is relatively new and people have been trying to use it to meet their own needs, but as the systems mature, there would seem to be not only efficiencies in operating one, but also much better data capture and much better quality of data through use.

    I have some understanding of the IBOC problem, which is the problem in linking to difficult.... In fact, I see a procurement there of $54,000. While it seems trivial at one level, it is remarkable that somebody can easily sell into something that small internationally. I think that's a real accomplishment, rather than the big numbers.

    Are we not approaching a time when we should start to function like one government and maximize the use of our existing resources, rather than spreading them over three, four, or five different services?

    Does somebody want to respond?

    Madam d'Auray, the coordinator of all that is holy.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: I'll make a stab at it. For the Government of Canada procurement of goods and services, the suppliers and the companies that register with us are not limited to Canadian companies. Under the various agreements these opportunities to supply to the Government of Canada are in fact open to more than just Canadian companies. So that argues for a supplier database that is essentially open to the world in many respects.

    With regard to growing business opportunities in Canada, you make a very good point. We have started to look at how many databases we are running and what the purposes are. Where we do make a distinction is with regard to the confidentiality of the information, which your colleague Mr. Lanctôt raised earlier. Can we make a distinction so that the information that is publicly accessible remains publicly accessible and the information that is company confidential, so to speak, remains confidential within a single integration? These databases have emerged from different public/private or confidential and public sources, and it is a good opportunity for us to look at how those can be combined, while assuring the companies at that point that the data that are confidential remain confidential.

    The Chair: Canada is not a large country. We have a finite number of businesses.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: That's right.

    The Chair: Yet we seem to be putting resources into duplicating that list.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: We're duplicating parts of that list, I would argue. Some of the specificity of the information that is required for the purposes of matching some of the opportunities is not found in the SourceCAN listing.

    The Chair: Does your office do any across-system accounting or tracking of the overall cost of maintaining all of these systems?

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: Of the databases, no.

    The Chair: Is that something you are capable of doing?

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: In terms of the details of the information that is available to us, no. We are capable of monitoring the cost of operating certain systems across the government, but not of going into the detailed cost of database management per se.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Forseth.

  (1235)  

    Mr. Roy Cullen: I thought I was on the list.

    The Chair: Yes, you are. We are now going back over here, and then we'll come back to you, Mr. Cullen. I have you down for another round.

    Mr. Paul Forseth: Thank you.

    On Thursday, Friday, and Saturday we had the Crossing Boundaries National Conference, and I'm sure you attended or were monitoring that conference. It outlined a vision and the larger theme of government online. In view of that, can you as a group tell me what your vision is? Part of the subset of that is that you say you are always evaluating the relative access and functionality of what you're doing. Is that going to get better? As part of that self-assessment you talk about really looking at value for dollar. Are any of those reports themselves ever going to be online? I'm asking a threefold question about the functionality, how things work; whether general access is going to expand and improve; whether any of the evaluations about what we're doing now are ever going to be opened up; and as far as a larger vision is concerned, where we are going in order to realize the vision of the Crossing Boundaries National Conference.

    The Chair: It's all in the last question.

    Go ahead, Madam d'Auray.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: I'll start with the last question about the broader vision. We are currently looking at the Business Gateway approach. We are looking at what the future is for online services to business; the future of the interaction between all of these services; what it means to provide a single-window, no-wrong-door approach for business, not just for the federal government's services and opportunities but also from governments across Canada. I think the portal as you see it today, the Business Gateway, tries to be as integrated as possible. But we know that a major leap forward has to take place in order to look at what is the most effective way of providing these services. What would it look like? How can you integrate online, in-person, and telephony-based services? So it's looking at the gamut of service offerings and modes of providing service.

    In terms of where we're going more specifically on some of the areas, I think my colleagues have indicated some of the forward-looking actions. On the government marketplace, which is trying to provide an integrated marketplace for commercially available goods and services, that will present an integrated view and a faster way of accessing those procurement opportunities for business. That will be a major shift for us. A catalogue system is now available. But the next generation of that will be significantly different and will provide a more integrated view of what those opportunities are. Madam Bennett's question was, can I access an equivalent range of opportunities and services so that I know what's available, and can I start getting a communality of service offerings?The answer to that will be yes, through the Government of Canada marketplace.

    In terms of the specific audits and evaluation reports, I'll leave that to my colleagues. The official audits, if they're undertaken within an audit practice, are to be posted online by each department and agency. So you will find them available on their departmental websites.

    Perhaps you can answer them specifically.

    The Chair: Mr. Cullen.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Thank you, Mr. Chairman .

    I'd like to come back to the fee charged to access the MERX system. It's currently $30 a month. It was $5 a month.

    I have a private member's bill, Bill C-212, which is now before the finance committee of the House of Commons. The bill says that before a fee can be increased or a new fee introduced, it has to meet a number of tests: there has to be full and complete consultation with users; it has to be benchmarked against our major trading partners; it has to have a business-impact type of analysis; it needs to be based on full costs, but those costs need to be clearly outlined; and it also has to confer private benefit.

    I know that the Federation of Independent Business is quite upset. To a lot of small and medium-sized enterprises $30 a month is a lot of money. I wonder if you could tell us what kind of process you went through when you increased the fee, what kind of feedback you had, and what cost pressures or other pressures brought the fee to that level.

  (1240)  

    Mr. Glen Bailey: The changes were made in the pricing at the time we extended the contract in order to allow us time to get ready to bring out the request for proposals for the new system.

    The business model had been bid against by Bank of Montreal in 1995 or 1996. They claimed that they had been losing money. We had an audit done. We went through the way the contract was structured. Experts within the department looked at the books and said, how was it structured, what services were they providing, and what were appropriate costs to be associated with that? So the increases we saw were ones that reflected that analysis.

    We know the reaction of CFIB. I would say that the cost structure is not one we would want to keep in the future if we could avoid it. We know, for example, that going all electronic will significantly reduce a number of the costs associated with the present service, and that's part of the way we envisage going. In the meantime we're in a situation between the ending of the old system and the beginning of the new system, and we have to make it work. We need a MERX system that will continue to provide the service. It doesn't meet some of the issues you raised about full consultation. I know that the size of the cost is a source of considerable anxiety, especially for smaller firms. But until we're able to take a look at the evaluation of the new offers and to move to that new fully electronic system, this is the system we will have to work with.

    Mr. Roy Cullen: Does it provide any additional functionality? That's question number one. Secondly, how does it compare to other countries, especially our major trading partners? Have you done any comparisons with similar systems?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: I can't comment on specific user fees in other systems.

    I do want to mention again that the system we have also covers a number of provincial governments. So people have access to the provincial as well as the federal procurement.

    In terms of other governments--

    Mr. Roy Cullen: I was wondering how competitive your fee for MERX is compared to other jurisdictions.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: In the U.S. system they do a slightly different thing. They have what they call the GSA schedule, and they charge a fee against the winning procurement.

    Some governments have chosen to pay for the service themselves. That's an issue we are examining in terms of the future system, but that means a commitment of resources by the government to be able to fund the system.

    I can go back and make some comparisons, if you want. I don't have that information right now in terms of being able to say this government charges x or y. There is a variety of systems out there.

    The Chair: Perhaps you could forward some comparison information to us.

    Monsieur Lanctôt.

[Translation]

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: I would like to pursue the line of questioning I started with Ms. D'Auray earlier. The public wants greater transparency and accountability and this is why we hope that we will review the Access to Information Act. Would it not be logical, if we want a democratic and transparent government and country with accountability, that people and businesses...? I understand that some things need to remain confidential during the tendering process. But once the contract is signed, why would it...? There are aspects of contracts that we need to be aware of. It would be very useful for us and for all citizens to know that the contract is for a given amount, a certain number of hours of work or of employees, and so on. The problem at the present time--and we have seen it with the sponsorship program and we still see it with the firearms registry--that no matter how many access to information requests we put in, there will always be exemptions where we will be told the information is confidential, that we cannot get access because it would jeopardize the company's competitive position. This is unacceptable! If that company chooses to sign a contract with a government, it should be prepared to have information made public.

    This would also make these dealings transparent for you. There would be fewer scandals, because when we can only find out through the backdoor or by way of brown enveloped shoved under our doors... It would allow us to do our job and see why contracts have been given to a given company. So I wonder if this should not be considered and if it would not be very positive for you, the officials.

  (1245)  

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: I think that when the call for tenders goes out the assessment criteria and the terms the companies need to meet are clearly defined and are public. Once the bids come in, and I will ask my colleague to elaborate--an assessment takes place. There is a first screening that looks at whether key elements have been provided or not. This is almost automatic: the information is there or it is not, the financing method has been explained or not.

    So we have an assessment at this level and it is totally transparent. Everybody knows exactly what information we need in order to assess the bids.

    After this first screening, there is an assessment made against clearly defined criteria. This is where bidders provide us with confidential commercial information because it has to do with competitive factors. But the conditions or the criteria against which the assessment is made are public and known by all. But the data provided in order for us to carry out the assessment are confidential because companies do not want their competitors to know what their costs are or what other terms are being offered.

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: That is fine at the time of bidding, but how about afterwards?

    Mme Michelle d'Auray: Once the contract is issued, most of the information is available but in some cases it can be considered as privileged commercial information.

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: Which happens all the time. This means that we would have to go to court every time in order to find out what we want to know. So any citizen of Canada wanting access to information... In view of the incredible number of access to information requests that we make, it means that we would have to spend our time in court to explain why we need the information instead of doing our job in Parliament. Very often we would succeed but the problem is that this exception in the Act is so wide that we get only one answer for every 20 requests and now even one out of 100 requests. It is getting ridiculous!

  (1250)  

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: One of the suggestions I could make would be to also ask the companies or the businesses themselves because very often it is they who refuse the communication of the information. We have to ask the company if it agrees to have the information released and it is their decision. If the company does not want to, it is not necessarily a refusal of access under the process.

    Mr. Robert Lanctôt: The attitude of private companies varies greatly. You are the government. If they want to do business with you, why not make it clear that information provided, once the contract has been signed, becomes public so that everyone can see what is in the contract, how things are supposed to be done, at what hourly rate, how many hours are being billed and so on. There should be supporting documentation. We cannot get access to these things. There is a call for tenders and bidding but we are unable to do any follow-up.

[English]

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Lanctôt and Madam d'Auray.

    Monsieur Lanctôt, as you know, we are going to be looking at the report of the access to information commissioner. It may be worth while to look at what the practices are in other countries relative to government procurement. One wonders if the boundary hasn't been drawn a bit too widely.

    I suspect that Madam d'Auray would like to rewrite some of this, but she doesn't really have the authority to do that yet.

    Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

    The Chair: I'd like to ask Mr. Bailey a question. In round terms, I note in your deck about $10 billion worth of procurement. If my memory serves me correctly, there's currently about $5 billion on MERX. Presumably within that there are some very large items that eat up big chunks of dough; for example, military procurement. I'm making this up. I don't know what it is. In that second $5 billion that's not on MERX, how much of that would be comprised of contracts of $100,000 or less? Do you have any idea?

    Mr. Glen Bailey: Contracts less than $25,000 would not normally be there. Then there could be very large amounts, sometimes contracts that are done through standing offers or other instruments, which may not necessarily be put on MERX. But what the relative distribution is of the dollar value of those contracts, I don't know.

    The Chair: When you talk in your deck about $10 billion, that's for total government procurement.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: By PWGSC.

    The Chair: Service contracts and such of $30,000 to $50,000 would be procured directly by line departments, or does all contracting come under--

    Mr. Glen Bailey: It depends on their individual delegations of authority and arrangements they have. It also depends on particular products and services.

    The Chair: So the $10 billion would not necessarily encompass all government purchasing.

    Mr. Glen Bailey: No.

    The Chair: It would be just government purchasing through PWGSC.

    Madam d'Auray, when you nod your head, then of course the second question comes. Do you have any estimate of the size of procurement over and above the $10 billion?

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: I will have to get back to you on that, Mr. Chairman.

    The Chair: May I ask you to get back to us on one other item. We asked a question here awhile ago about the.... Actually, we didn't ask it here. We sought this information from ministers. It was about the amount of money spent on the development of new electronic services online or otherwise, not money that is currently spent for telephones or for operating existing systems, but money that's in development, including systems that are underway and contracts that have been let to build new systems. The number I got back was $60 million government-wide, which strikes me as a bit of an undershoot. If that's all the new development that's going on, I would be surprised at that. If it's not, I'm surprised that's the number I got. Perhaps it would be possible to tease that number out a bit just to get the extent of the activity. We can look under the standard objects at the total amount of money spent in that area, but a lot of that is for maintaining existing systems. It's new development in the works.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: Could I ask a point of clarification. You're looking for that within what timeframe? As you know--

    The Chair: In this year's budget.

    Ms. Michelle d'Auray: In 2003-04.

    The Chair: Yes.

    I think that brings us to the end of this session. I want to thank all of you for spending time with us. Given that I had at least one call from one minister saying, be nice, I think we were reasonably gentle. I do appreciate your willingness to come forward and have this conversation. I suspect we will have others in the future as we get further into these issues that cut across departments. Thank you.

    Members, tomorrow from 9 to 1 in room 362 East Block we will be doing clause-by-clause on Bill C-25.

    We're adjourned.