Questions and responses 40th Parliament, 3rd session March 3, 2010, to March 26, 2011

With regard to bids submitted for the contract for the Integrated Relocation Program of Public Works and Government Services Canada in the years 2002, 2004 and 2009: (a) how many bids were submitted by qualified bidders and under what names; and (b) how many bids were submitted by all bidders, qualified or otherwise, and under what names?

With regard to Public Works and Government Services Canada: (a) what are the total number of contracts under $10,000 awarded between January 2008 and December 2009; (b) what were the names of the suppliers; (c) what services did they provide; (d) what were the start and end dates of each contract; and (e) what was the contractor code for each supplier?

With regard to Public Works and Government Services Canada, what grants and contributions under $25,000 did it award from January 1, 2009, to the present?

With regard to Public Works and Government Services Canada, what contracts under $10,000 did it award from September 1, 2009, to the present, including the vendor's name, the date, the amount and the description?

With respect to Public Works and Government Services Canada, for every project over 5 million dollars which received money from the department in the last 5 years and which involved incurred or currently foreseen cost overruns of 15% or more relative to the initial predictions: (a) what is the name of that project and details on its nature; (b) what is the history of cost predictions for that project, including (i) dates of predictions reviews and amounts of the predictions, (ii) itemized predictions on the costs of different subparts of that project; (c) what are the reasons for the cost overruns; (d) what are the dates at which ministers or their close staff were informed of the cost predictions described in part (b), what was the name of the Minister or staffer that received the information and what is a description of the actions taken, if any, by the Minister in reaction to that information; and (e) what is, in percentage (compared with the initial prediction), and in dollars, the final incurred value or the currently expected value of the cost overrun?

With regard to advertising by Public Works and Government Services Canada or its agencies: (a) what was the total amount of money spent by the department and each of its agencies since January 1, 2009, in multi-cultural targeted print, radio, television and web-based media; (b) what was the exact placement of each ad purchase; and (c) what was the target demographic of each advertisement?

With respect to allegations of political interference in responding to requests under the Access to Information Act: (a) how many allegations have been brought to the attention of the Privy Council Office or the Prime Minister’s Office since January 23, 2006; (b) in which departments or agencies were these allegations made; (c) on what dates did each alleged incident occur; and (d) what actions were taken to remedy each situation?

With respect to the Department of Public Works and Government Services (PWGSC) contract for Engineering and Technical Services (ETS): (a) for each task to be completed under this contract, did the contractor perform the task as stipulated in the contract and, (i) if not, for each of the uncompleted tasks, what are the reasons for which the tasks were not completed and what are the details of the paragraphs of the contract that were changed, (ii) if yes, when did the Department confirm the work had been completed for each task; (b) what measures did the Department put in place to ensure that the contractor respected the contract; (c) has the contract already been audited; (d) how many reports did the contractor provide with a progress update on the tasks; (e) when were the reports in (d) presented to the contracting authority and what were their titles; (f) who was responsible for monitoring and approving the transition from the former contractor to the current contractor; (g) what measures were taken by the contracting authority to verify progress on outstanding tasks; (h) did the contractor inform PWGSC of its staffing plans, which included using people hired by the former contractor; (i) ten business days after the contract’s start date, (i) how many CVs had been provided, (ii) what were the names of the people suggested by the contractor and how many of them then worked on the contract; (j) was the ETS contract changed and, if yes, what changes were made and on what dates; (k) was the contractor paid for all the services provided before the end of the transition period; (l) regarding the drafting process for the request for proposal, (i) what is the detailed explanation of the process and the milestone dates, (ii) who were the public servants who participated in drafting the request for proposal; (m) regarding the proposal evaluation process, (i) what is the detailed explanation of the process, (ii) what exactly does the “reconfirmation” step consist of, (iii) who were the public servants who participated in evaluating the proposals and approving the choice of contractor; (n) what are the names of the people or specialized companies that participated in drafting the request for proposal and how were these people or businesses selected; (o) what are the names of the people or specialized companies that participated in evaluating the proposals and how were these people or businesses selected; (p) what are the names of the people or specialized companies that participated in the contracting process and how were these people or businesses selected; (q) did the evaluation documents and relevant computer files remain in the possession and under the control of public servants during (i) the drafting of the request for proposal, (ii) the evaluation of proposals, (iii) the awarding of the contract; (r) can the Department confirm that it still has all the documents in (q) in its possession; (s) regarding the services of a fairness monitor for this contract, (i) who made the decision not to use the services of a fairness monitor for this contract, (ii) when was this decision made, (iii) for what reasons was a fairness monitor not retained; (t) as to a forensic audit, (i) who decided not to refer this file for a forensic audit after allegations of interference and conflict of interest were raised, (ii) when was this decision made and for what reasons; (u) did the office of the Minister of PWGSC, the Minister himself, or his deputy minister have discussions with public servants regarding the content of the request for proposals for ETS, the evaluation of the proposals or the contracting process and, if applicable, (i) what was the purpose of these discussions, (ii) who instigated the discussions, (iii) when did these discussions take place; (v) during the period from February 6, 2006, to June 24, 2008, did the Minister of PWGSC announce he was in a conflict of interest and, if yes, (i) when and with respect to what file, (ii) what was the nature of the conflict of interest; and (w) did PWGSC require that the references submitted by each of the bidders be checked and, if applicable, (i) who was responsible for carrying out the reference checks, (ii) when were the checks done for each of the bidders, (iii) who identified the mention of a company associated with the bidder, (iv) what were the reasons for approving a bid with references to an associated company, (v) was Innovapost Inc. identified in one of the bids?

With regard to payments issued by Public Works and Government Services Canada in fiscal years 2009-2010 and 2010-2011: (a) how much was issued for payment on behalf of Infrastructure Canada for signage, in each fiscal year; and (b) what cheques were issued for payments on behalf of Infrastructure Canada for signage, in each fiscal year, including the date each cheque was issued?

With regard to Infrastructure Canada's answer to question Q-432 in the 2nd Session of the 40th Parliament, what are the details surrounding the $0.25 cost for the announcement of September 13, 2009 concerning the expenditure of $3,250,000?

With regard to all e-mail correspondence between ministers’ exempt staff and staff at the Department of Public Works and Government Services which occurred between January 1, 2007 and December 31, 2009, excluding all matters which are in their nature secret, for each e-mail: (a) what are its contents; (b) what are the names of the (i) sender, (ii) recipients; and (c) on what date was it sent?