PACP Committee Report

Liberal Supplementary Report on “Replacing Canada’s Fighter Jets”
Chapter 2 of the Auditor General of Canada’s Spring 2012 Report

The process to replace Canada’s Fighter Jets has been a disaster from the beginning.  In the House of Commons on May 27, 2010, Defence Minister Peter MacKay stated, “this next generation fighter, again, will be an open, competitive, transparent process...”  Despite this promise, the Conservative government decided to proceed with the purchase of the F-35 without following a competitive process.  Furthermore, National Defence did not provide a statement of operational requirements necessary to qualify for an exception to the nGovernment Contracts Regulations until after the government announced that it was purchasing the F-35.  One of the largest procurements in Canadian history was justified as a sole-source contract based on a flimsy one page letter from National Defence to Public Works and Government Services.   

Much like the process to procure Canada’s next Fighter Jet, the committee’s study of Chapter 2 of the Auditor General’s Spring 2012 Report has not been transparent.  Despite years of precedence at the Public Accounts committee that the first witness on an Auditor General’s report is the Auditor General, the Conservative majority sought to block his appearance before the committee.  It was only after the Opposition Chair of the Committee threatened to resign his position, that the Conservative majority relented and allowed the Auditor General to testify.

Similarly, the witness list for the study was controlled exclusively by the Conservative majority to limit the committee’s ability to fulfill its Parliamentary obligation to conduct an in-depth and constructive examination of the report.  On April 19, 2012, the Liberal Party put forward a motion to hear from a list of relevant witnesses and to have them appear in an orderly manner as panels so that each witness would have the opportunity to answer the committee’s questions.  The motion was not presented as a final list, and allowed for other witnesses to  appear.  The Conservative majority defeated this motion.  When the Liberal Party raised the concern at this meeting that the government will try to swamp the committee’s ability to effectively question witnesses by having too many appear at one time, Conservative committee Member Daryl Kramp stated the following, “The last thing we need is to have a whole group of witnesses coming in here, eight or nine witnesses at one point, and not be able to dig down and drill down when we should and when we need to.”   Despite this statement, as a result of a Conservative motion, on May 1, 2012, the committee heard from exactly eight witnesses at once, and for a mere hour and forty minutes.  This type of self-contradiction clearly demonstrates that the Conservative majority was not sincere about effectively studying this important report.     

The response by the Conservative government to the Auditor General’s report is troubling.  For perhaps the first time in Canadian history, we have a situation where Deputy Ministers and departments are saying one thing, and the Minister is saying something completely different.   While the government claims that it has accepted the findings of the Auditor General and his recommendations, National Defence and Public Works and Government Services continue to reject the conclusions of the report.

Ministerial accountability is not a “pick and choose” issue for a minister. The Minister is responsible for every action of his ministry.   It is shocking for a Minister to say in the House of Commons that he accepts the Auditor General’s report and recommendations only to have his Deputy Minister state at committee that this is not the case.  How can the Minister and the department have different views on something of such paramount importance?  This issue has clearly demonstrated that the concept of Ministerial Accountability under this Conservative government has died. 

The Conservative government has refused to address the root problems identified in the Auditor General’s report, and instead they have chosen to re-arrange the deck chairs on the Titanic.  They have removed the file from National Defence and handed it over to Public Works and Government Services.  They initially referred to this new secretariat as the “F-35 Secretariat,” which provides further proof that they are 100% c committed to the F-35 to the exclusion of other aircraft.   It was only after public ridicule that the name was changed to the “National Fighter Procurement Secretariat”.

The Conservative government has touted their “seven-point action plan” to address the issues raised by the Auditor General, but this plan will only achieve the same results because they are working with the same “Statement of Operational Requirements” that was produced to select the F-35 in 2010.  Furthermore, it was Public Works who wrongly accepted a one page letter from National Defence as a reason for the sole-source purchase, contrary government rules, and it is this same department that is now in charge of this procurement.   Albert Einstein once said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.  This is a fitting description of what the government is doing with the procurement of Canada’s new fighter jets. 

The Parliamentary Budget Office and the Auditor General have both stated that the government has failed to provide accurate costing information on the F-35, and despite promising this information to Parliament, the government is already many months behind their self imposed deadlines on providing this information. 

Recommendation

That the government send the “Statement of Operational Requirements” for review to the National Research Council like they have done for the Fixed-Wing Search and Rescue Program and proceed with a new open and transparent acquisition program to replace our aging CF-18 fighter jets.