The Government of Quebec is the main purchaser of goods and services from the province. As in most other countries in the world, the government cannot spend taxpayers’ money as it sees fit. Before awarding a contract to a supplier of goods or services, it must comply with a set of legal rules relating to public procurement. Given the fact that these expenditures represent nearly 14% of GDP, we understand the importance of these rules since they ultimately have an impact on the way our government spends our money.
Last spring, the Government of Quebec considerably modified the general legislative framework governing public contracts by imposing — finally — on public buyers to buy more local, more sustainable and more responsible products. The Act respecting contracting by public bodies has thus been brought up to date.
These changes have raised many questions and are worrying public buyers, who will have to change their ways of doing things considerably. If we can understand the resulting upheaval, we must face the facts: Quebec had accumulated a delay of at least ten years vis-à-vis its trading partners.
However, in this area, no economy wants to be late. Because who says delay says loss of competitiveness and luck. However, the old Quebec framework was almost silent on local, sustainable and responsible purchasing. Compared to the countries of the European Union, several states in the United States, Korea and Tunisia, Quebec fared poorly.
The new provisions have been drafted in compliance with our international trade obligations. In fact, the government has taken care to adjust the legal system by taking advantage of all the leeway that our free trade agreements leave us.
Thus, contracts awarded to supply school or penitentiary cafeterias, government offices, major infrastructure projects or even hospital equipment must favor Quebec purchases (or Canadian purchases above a certain threshold) and include at least a condition linked to sustainable development.
The government is therefore catching up, at least on the legislative level. But the reality goes far beyond the law. It requires a change in ways of doing things, raising the awareness of public bodies, government purchasers and contractors. They must quickly assimilate an often technical language, navigate through international standards and determine what constitutes a sustainable and responsible purchase. In addition, they must do so while being mindful of the impact this may have on Quebec industries since the new framework requires that purchases be local.
The new version of the Act now requires the government to tackle an enormous task: that of providing its public buyers with the tools to enable them to buy truly sustainable and responsible goods and services, while favoring local purchases. This is a major project that must be led by the government. The Netherlands and Korea are champions in this respect. They have created extremely effective IT tools that have allowed them to lead their industries to transform and innovate.
Quebec has made a giant leap. But he must do more and better. He must do this so that the products and services he buys are actually produced under conditions that respect human rights and the environment. He must do this to push his companies to innovate more. It must do so to make Quebec businesses competitive on international markets. He must finally do it to promote his own companies that already meet these requirements.