(Ottawa) The federal government buys from suppliers without really assessing whether they pose a national security risk or have ties to organizations – like hostile governments – that pose a threat.
The story so far
November 2020: PSPC receives a request from the RCMP to open a call for tenders for communications equipment.
July 2021: Two bidders are selected: Sinclair Technologies and Comprod.
October 2021: The contract is awarded to Sinclair Technologies.
December 2022: The contract is suspended following the publication of the Radio-Canada report.
This finding stems from a review surrounding the awarding of a telecommunications contract for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) to Sinclair Technologies, a company based in Canada but linked to the Government of China.
A senior official from Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) had predicted it: the purchase of the devices respected the tendering process, but it was going to come back to haunt the public service.
“While there doesn’t appear to be any security concerns with the technology, make sure the companies supplying these devices do not,” the senior procurement manager wrote.
“I would recommend keeping this approval on file for future review,” he concluded in an email included in the review report that The Press obtained under the Access to Information Act.
Nearly a year and a half later, Radio-Canada revealed that the federal government had set its sights on the offer of the company controlled by Hytera Communications, a Chinese company 10% owned by Beijing through a fund of investment.
Blind spots
Opposition rose up, and further scrutiny there was. Investigators from the Special Investigations and Internal Disclosure Directorate combed through the processes in place at PSPC and concluded that everything had been done according to the rules.
The problem?
It was determined that none [processus] did not allow for an assessment of the national security risks with respect to the supplier and its connection to players who could pose a threat.
Excerpt from a summary of the review report that The Press obtained
Because “the existing mechanisms are only focused on the goods and services that we wish to acquire from the subcontractor and the security clearance assigned to them”, we add in the summary prepared for a sub – Deputy Minister of PSPC.
The Department, the government’s largest purchaser with about $22 billion in spending each year, could make internal changes, but that wouldn’t entirely eliminate the risks, the report itself points out.
A broader effort may be needed “to identify any shortcomings and mitigate this type of risk”, and to this end, after a meeting organized by the Department of Public Safety, PSPC decided to set up a work.
Harmless device or suspicious device?
The RCMP itself had concluded that the devices did not pose a security risk.
A federal police official who was involved in reviewing the contract said “it was literally a cylindrical box with two coaxial adapters and a piece in the middle that is used as an antenna for the RCMP frequency. “.
This does not make it a harmless device, however, reacts Margaret McCuaig-Johnston, a former senior federal official now a member of the advisory board of the China Strategic Risks Institute, an international think tank.
It’s that the National Intelligence Act of Beijing provides that “every organization or citizen must support and assist the intelligence work of the State and cooperate therein […] and maintain the secrecy of all knowledge of the state’s work,” she notes.
“This provision of the law is not designed for companies that manufacture toys,” she quips. It is designed for telecommunications companies that can spy on behalf of China. »
Very critical of Xi Jinping’s regime, she believes that “we are still very naive”.
Lowest bidder: at what price?
The federal government is also erring in opting for the lowest bidders, she argues. For this contract, with comparable technology, PSPC preferred the bid of the company partly owned by Beijing to that of the Quebec company Comprod.
The price difference ? About $60,000 for the contract worth half a million.
Sinclair has been driving prices down for years. The prices are more competitive, and people consider it a benefit, but in fact, we are taking a risk by letting Chinese-related companies interfere in our systems.
Margaret McCuaig-Johnston, Advisory Board Member, China Strategic Risks Institute
Assistant professor of international affairs at Carleton University, former analyst at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), Stephanie Carvin shares this opinion, but in part.
“It’s not necessarily a bad thing that the government respects taxpayers’ money and chooses the lowest bidder. That said, what is the true cost of the lowest bidder? Better price does not mean better value,” she argues.
What seems obvious to him, however, is that the security screening mechanisms must be tightened. “It’s not explicitly stated in the report, but I think we have to start focusing on the issue of ownership [des entreprises] “, she says.
And we don’t need to reinvent the wheel, judges Professor Carvin: “We can draw up a list like the United States. “The same United States which had blacklisted Hytera Communications, prohibiting it from participating in government tenders…
At PSPC, we did not react to the report within the allotted time.
With the collaboration of William Leclerc, The Press