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37th PARLIAMENT, 1st SESSION

Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Thursday, June 6, 2002

1115

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy (Toronto, Lib.))

Mr. Richard Paré (Parliamentary Librarian, Library of Parliament)

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Richard Paré

1120

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.)

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. François LeMay (Director General, Information and Documentation, Library of Parliament)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

1125

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Richard Paré

1130

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

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

The Joint Clerk of the Committee (Mr. Jean-François Pagé)

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Ms. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West—Nepean, Lib.)

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

1135

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Ken Epp

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Ms. Marlene Catterall

1140

Mr. Richard Paré

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. Richard Paré

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. Richard Paré

Ms. Marlene Catterall

1145

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

1150

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

Mr. François LeMay

Ms. Marlene Catterall

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP)

1155

Mr. Richard Paré

Ms. Wendy Lill

Mr. Richard Paré

1200

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Andrew Telegdi (Kitchener—Waterloo, Lib.)

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Ken Epp

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Senator Gérald Beaudoin (Rigaud, PC)

1205

Mr. Richard Paré

Senator Gérald Beaudoin

Mr. Richard Paré

Senator Gérald Beaudoin

Mr. Richard Paré

Senator Gérald Beaudoin

Mr. Richard Paré

Senator Gérald Beaudoin

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Jerry Pickard (Chatham—Kent Essex, Lib.)

1210

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Jerry Pickard

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Jerry Pickard

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

1215

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

Mr. Richard Paré

1220

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Ms. Wendy Lill

Mr. Mauril Bélanger

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. Richard Paré

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

1225

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

Mr. François LeMay

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

1230

Mr. Andrew Telegdi

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy)

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Mr. Jerry Pickard

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

1235

Mr. Ken Epp

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

Mr. Richard Paré

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett)

CANADA

Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament

NUMBER 005

1st SESSION

37th PARLIAMENT

EVIDENCE

Thursday, June 6, 2002

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Á (1115)

[English]

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy (Toronto, Lib.)): Welcome to the Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament.

We have Mr. Paré here today. Mr. Paré, you will be making a presentation as to the study of the request for proposal 01-0205, electronic news monitoring service.

Mr. Richard Paré (Parliamentary Librarian, Library of Parliament): Bonjour.

Thank you, Madam Co-Chair.

First, I would like to introduce Monsieur François Lemay, le directeur général du service d'information et de documentation de la Bibliothèque, and Ms. Margi Young, who is a legal analyst at the law and government division of the parliamentary research branch. Unfortunately, Madam Lynn Brodie, who is the director of collections and was the most involved with that file, is out of the country and cannot be with us today.

We have circulated, as requested by the committee at the last meeting, a summary of the decision of the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, and we have also circulated a two-page document, a request for proposal, giving some background information and the chronology that followed the decision of the tribunal. I don't intend to make a long presentation on that. I'm sure all the members have received the documentation. What we will do is answer questions from the members.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you, Monsieur Paré. I only just received mine outside the door, so maybe you could go over it very quickly. Maybe some others didn't receive theirs either.

Mr. Richard Paré: I can read the background information, if that's acceptable.

In November 2000 the information services directorate of the House of Commons advised the library that it had become necessary to replace the existing application of the current news monitoring service. On February 28, 2001, the library issued request for proposal 01-0205, with a closing date of March 20, 2001, for the supply of a new electronic news monitoring service. Pursuant to this RFP, one of the bidders, P & L Communications, asked seven questions of the library on March 2, 2001. The library responded to three non-technical questions by March 13, and then responded to an additional question from P & L Communications on March 16, 2001. The library followed up with a reply to the remainder of P & L Communications' questions on March 19, 2001. That included the technical questions.

Because of the delay in responding to P & L Communications, the library then extended the RFP closing date to March 26, 2001. On March 21 the library was notified that P & L Communications had filed a complaint on March 14 with the Canadian International Trade Tribunal relative to the library procurement process. Once again, on March 23, the library decided to extend the closing date to May 14, in order to give a chance to all the potential bidders to make their bids.

In the meantime the library, as well as the House of Commons information services directorate staff and managers, met several times, and they looked at how to find a solution to the problem we had. They found a solution with the technical staff of the House and the librarians and technical information staff of the library. The service we had at that time had made significant improvements, and the replacement of the application was no longer urgent.

On May 10 the library advised potential bidders that the RFP had now been extended to June 1, and during this time the library responded to questions from other bidders. On May 22, 2001, the library submitted its Government institution report to the CITT, as required by them. On June 1, at the request of the co-chair of the Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament, the library extended the closing date to July 31, 2001.

The rest is contained in the summary of the decision of the trade tribunal.

Á (1120)

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you, Mr. Paré.

Monsieur Bélanger.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger (Ottawa—Vanier, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

What is the library doing now to provide this service?

Mr. Richard Paré: We continue to provide the same service with the same providers, because the changes we have made are significant enough to ensure that we can provide the service.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Who are these providers?

Mr. Richard Paré: The same we had. The name of the company is Densan.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Is it possible, without infringing any secrets, to know if they were one of the companies bidding on RFP 01-0205?

Mr. François LeMay (Director General, Information and Documentation, Library of Parliament): They did bid on the first RFP we issued. They did not bid on the second RFP, the one we are now referring to.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: You've only mentioned the second RFP here, correct?

Mr. Richard Paré: We are talking of the last RFP that was challenged by one company, P & L Communications.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Now that you're here, we're in a bit of quandary, because there were two RFPs. The first one is not even alluded to in the documents we've received. It also was challenged, if I recall, and the library decided not to proceed, but we're not aware of this thing. I'm really trying to point out that there are gaps in the information we've been given.

Densan, you say, submitted on the first RFP, but not on the second. Since when has Densan been providing this service to the library?

Mr. François LeMay: The exact date I don't know. Densan has been the provider since we started providing Parliament with access to what we call PARLMEDIA, electronic newspaper information.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: That was sole-sourced?

Mr. François LeMay: No. When Densan came in, this was a very new system, and very few people could provide that type of system, making it available as a server. There were two companies, as far as I recall. I was not involved in the selection process myself, but was aware that there were two companies that were able to provide that type of service in those days. They were both asked to submit a proposal to the library, and Densan was selected based on evaluation of the various services they could provide.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Would it possible to know how much money has been paid by the Government of Canada, through whatever line item, to Densan since that has started?

Mr. Richard Paré: It is the library, and the figure I was given was in the range of $15,000 a year.

Á (1125)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: For how many years now?

Mr. Richard Paré: I would say it's four years, but I would have to check that.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Is it $15,000 or $50,000?

[Translation]

Mr. Richard Paré: Fifteen thousand dollars.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Can we check that?

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes, it can be checked, but I don't have it with me at this time.

[English]

But this doesn't include the feed.

[Translation]

Mr. François LeMay: The current contract is for a total amount of $15,000 a year. So, we are paying some $1,300 a month for maintenance services provided by Densan. I think that about 20 departments use this supplier. For the supplier, it is simply a matter of maintaining his application.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: And there are other costs, you say?

Mr. François LeMay: Densan provides an application. The additional costs that have been mentioned are for the newspapers. Whoever our application supplier is, be it PL or another one, it does not provide newspapers. It provides the application. We have to pay for the newspapers. At this time, we are paying that under the terms of a contract we have negotiated with Public Works which negotiates for all of the departments.

[English]

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Madam Chair, I must admit there's some confusion in my mind. I can't speak for other colleagues, but I don't have a clear picture of the service we're getting or what the library was trying to get. There were numbers bandied about of $100,000 for the value of the contract, $25,000 for equipment, in the documents that were given to us by the library, which the Canadian International Trade Tribunal concurred with. And all of a sudden, we're finding out that one that was bidding in the first RFP, which we're not being told about in these documents, has continued to provide the service without a competitive bidding process.

I need more information about what exactly we asked these people to do, the magnitude of it, and whether or not everything is as per the tribunal's decision. The tribunal's decision is that the library should redo its RFP to be in concurrence with our international obligations on calls for proposals. The library then decided not to proceed; it said it didn't have the money, because it paid $24,000 to the party that won the tribunal case, plus $15,000 to their own lawyers--I've got to get the name of those lawyers, because they're not expensive. But we were talking about an envelope of $100,000, and the library decided not to proceed, because it didn't have enough money any more. That was last year. This year they do have enough money, but they're not proceeding any more.

I must admit to some confusion about the behaviour of the library in this and the information provided.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Monsieur Paré.

Mr. Richard Paré: First, I'd like to refer to the first RFP. In 1999 we had a recommendation with the House that eventually we would have to look at a new electronic monitoring service system. At that time it was not so urgent as last year. We started drafting an RFP, we made a presentation, we posted it on the MERX, and then we followed the same process. We had six bidders at the time; four were retained, two were excluded, because of technical matters, and of the four two were selected for a test. After the test we decided to stop the whole process. That was because, in my view, we put the basic requirement too high. We must understand here that we are dealing with new technology and many companies in that area that are moving. There's a lot of competition. On the other hand, we had our criteria, which, frankly, were put too high by our manager. I said, we'll stop the process, we will review it, and we will reassess all the requirements. Then there came in November the urgent request from the House of Commons that we do this right away. We started the process again. This is the story of the first RFP.

The other point I want to talk about is the $100,000 you indicated. This is what the tribunal set, but we thought the new system wouldn't cost more than $60,000 to $80,000. This is what we had planned in the budget. We were so sure of that, we were so comfortable with those figures that when the complaint came, we even asked the tribunal not to pursue the complaint, because their minimum level is $100,000 for services. They came back and said, this is not acceptable, because it could be over $100,000. We continued to prepare the documentation to answer the tribunal.

Á (1130)

When you talk about the money we don't have, I indicated clearly in a memo to all members of the joint committee on September 25, 2001, the two reasons I decided to stop. First, it was because we knew the system was working well. I will explain what we did to reach that. There was no urgency to move right away. The second thing is that the cost of the legal fees was adding, we estimated, between $50,000 to $60,000. In fact, it was in the range of $40,000 and $50,000, because we have paid that during the year. That was taking a portion of the money that was identified for that project during that fiscal year.

As to the database, the information I have is that they reconfigured it, the staff of the library, the librarians, the technical staff, and the technical staff of the House of Commons, with Densan. I'm not a specialist, but the way I understand it, the problem was that every time you had a descriptor with an article, it was going in the database. You could have four, five, or six descriptors for the same article, but the article went with each descriptor. So it was creating a problem, and they decided to remodel the database with pointers. Now they have all the descriptors that point to the same article, but the article is only once in the database. That was a major change. In fact, in my own words, I think they moved to the relational model we use more in databases today.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett (St. Paul's, Lib.)): I don't really want to redo the work of the tribunal, I just want to know, if somebody complained today, what the tribunal would say about what's happened since then. Second, what has the library learned from the fact that you've spent $40,000 in legal fees for a $15,000 contract, so that never happens again?

Mr. Richard Paré: This is what I indicated in my memo to the members on 25th: I will ensure throughout any new process of the RFB that we are not in contempt of any of the procurement rules or practices of the tribunal.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): I wish we could go back and look at it.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Madam Chair, I'd have to go and check at what point I became a member of this committee, but I don't recall seeing that memo. I'm not even sure it was sent to this committee, perhaps to the House affairs committee.

[Translation]

The Joint Clerk of the Committee (Mr. Jean-François Pagé): I was not the clerk at that time. I will have to check this with the person who was.

[English]

Mr. Richard Paré: It was sent to the two speakers and all members of the Standing Joint Committee on the Library of Parliament, at their request. It was following an article by Kathryn May in the Ottawa Citizen in August.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): That was when?

Mr. Richard Paré: The memo was sent on September 25, 2001, to all members.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Do you remember getting it?

Ms. Marlene Catterall (Ottawa West—Nepean, Lib.): I remember taking it out in reply to a member in the context of the Board of Internal Economy.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Okay.

Mauril, did you want to follow up?

Á (1135)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I don't want to take up all the time. I can go on for quite a while.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Mr. Epp, then.

Mr. Ken Epp (Elk Island, Canadian Alliance): Thank you.

As a new member of this committee, I'm very curious about this. I didn't get this stuff until I walked in here, so that's why I'm not very well informed, and I apologize for that. Let me just get this straight, then. About two years ago you decided the system needed to be replaced, so you put out your request for a proposal. You are still with your old system today, are you not? Are you planning on staying with it, or are you, in fact, going to proceed to replace it?

Mr. Richard Paré: Because of the maintenance work we did on the system and the database, we plan to stay with it for this period of time.

Mr. Ken Epp: So you don't have any intention in the foreseeable future to replace it?

Mr. Richard Paré: It will probably happen, but there's no urgency at this time.

Mr. Ken Epp: So what timeline are you looking at, two, three years, five?

Mr. Richard Paré: Probably not five, probably two years, I would say. After that we will have to reassess. And my feeling--not understanding, but feeling--is that the systems on the market will improve too, so it may be possible to have a better system for serving parliamentarians at that time.

Mr. Ken Epp: When you put this documentation out, is it done strictly by the library or does it go through Public Works and Government Services?

Mr. Richard Paré: This is prepared by the library and the House of Commons information services directorate, which is responsible for all the technical infrastructure on the Hill for electronic services.

Mr. Ken Epp: So this didn't go through Public Works?

Mr. Richard Paré: Not for consultations, no. It's put on the MERX, though, their system.

Mr. Ken Epp: In the last 20 years I would think the library must have put in a great number of proposals such as this, because of the rapid change in technology in that time. As I always say, when I started teaching, we were still using slide rules, and now look where we are. You must have undergone that same kind of massive change in the way you do library work. So I'm rather surprised this appeal to the tribunal actually was necessary. I just scanned it, and for example, you made specific references to trade names of equipment and so on. I've been involved in procuring equipment too in computer works in my previous life, and you just never do that. I'm surprised. Who in the library wouldn't know that basic rule when writing a request for a proposal?

Mr. Richard Paré: You may have a point, and perhaps we should look at the way we prepare our RFPS in the future. We were probably guilty there in misinterpreting what they call products and what we call standards. Standards for us meant application of this infrastructure on Parliament Hill. I think it was that definition that made up part of the issue, probably the main part of the issue.

Mr. Ken Epp: For example, because you were already Windows-based, you said there was no great problem, but if somebody was non-Windows, they would have to provide support. This was part of the contention that there were unequal requirements, depending on where you were coming from, and this is why the thing went to the tribunal. I guess you're telling us it was just an honest mistake by whoever put this together.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes.

Mr. Ken Epp: I would repeat Mr. Bélanger's request. Has the lesson now been well learned, so that in the future this won't happen again? I'm anticipating, according to what you said earlier--this is why I asked the question--that within the next three to five years you're going to be doing this again. So I just want assurance that the lesson has been well learned.

Mr. Richard Paré: I can assure you that it has.

Mr. Ken Epp: Okay. Thank you.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Ms. Catterall.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: I have concerns from a couple of points of view here. First, how we contract for services, information services in particular, is going to become an increasingly current issue with us. I think that's one thing this committee really wants to look at, whether we are at the top of our game in providing the best possible information services to MPs, given new technology. So I'm concerned about a contract process that can get us into this mess not once, but twice. It's been a fundamental problem with contracting, not only here, but throughout government.

This is a very small contract in comparison with what we might face in the future, but the big problem is always specifying the product you want, as opposed to what you're trying to accomplish. We apparently didn't learn that lesson between the first RFP and the second one. I'm concerned that we learn how to do an RFP for these kinds of services, that we learn out of this experience, and that we get the best expertise we can in how to do that, not telling people the product you want them to give you, but what it is you want, whatever they can offer you to do it. Especially in a field that is so innovative, it is very important to know the difference between specifying a product and specifying a service. So I would like to know, between our RFP 1 and our RFP 2, what did we learn? Did we consult any experts in this field? Did we consult a lawyer, so we wouldn't make the same mistakes? And if so, what kind of advice did we get?

Á (1140)

Mr. Richard Paré: You're asking for my memory between the two.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: That's what we're here to discuss. We must have the facts.

Mr. Richard Paré: I don't think we consulted a lawyer. I don't think we consulted the House of Commons. As I indicated, the first RFP was stopped because of the requirements, and not all the bidders were meeting the requirements.

I want just to pursue, because you referred to it, the kind of service we will need. This is a concern we have. We want to produce the best quality service, and this is probably why in the first RFP we put the requirements too high. We have to follow the technology too. I know in the House this is also what they want, to have the best for parliamentarians.

Do you remember any actions we took between the two?

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Madam Chair, or I should say mesdames chairs, I wonder if we could not depend on memory. I think Mr. Bélanger is quite right, we don't have the whole story here. My recollection is that there was a CITT decision with the first RFP as well. We may have had other reasons for changing that, but we also got a negative decision from the CITT. We then went into a second one, and what I'm hearing is that nobody remembers whether we got expert advice on how to avoid the same problems. Therefore, we encountered $40,000 in legal fees that perhaps could have been avoided had we consulted appropriate expertise. I hate paying lawyer's fees, I tell you—what do you have to show at the end of it? If we can avoid paying lawyer's fees, that's really good.

Anyway, I'm concerned about that. If we don't learn to get contracting right, we put a lot of businesses through a lot of expense. It cost us $40,000 in legal fees, plus God knows what else over a two-year process of meetings and so on, but it cost each of those businesses. That's also a cost of apparently not doing it appropriately, according to the CITT. I'm not making that judgment, they did. So we have to fix that.

We also have to look at why we had a screwy system that had ten copies of the same article, because whatever company was doing this for us didn't know enough to have one article linked to key words. Now we've got a new contract with the same company.

Mr. Richard Paré: It was maintenance, and we keep the same maintenance contract with the same company.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Why did we have a system like that in the first place, if we have confidence in the company that's doing it for us? Anybody knows you don't have the same information in your database ten times, you have the right links to it.

Á (1145)

Mr. François LeMay: I think I can address two points you've raised. Basically, the decision by the tribunal was to reject the complaint on a technicality, I grant you. So we did not have a decision at that time on the technical definitions that were used in the RFP. I understand what you're saying. If we had had the same decision initially, we probably would have changed the wording in the second RFP.

After the first RFP was issued, we went back, and the technical specifications are essentially provided to us by the people who support us, the technical people in the House. We were assured that the way it was phrased would not be a problem. So we went ahead with that and all the specifications the library had. We understand it, and we may have confused you with the expressions that we used, but our requirements that we were saying--

Ms. Marlene Catterall: I'm not easily confused.

Mr. François LeMay: I'm sorry, that wasn't meant--

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: That's okay, I am.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): I'm really confused.

Mr. François LeMay: When we were talking about the library specifications being too rigid, no one could meet those requirements. We wanted to be able to search the database in 20 different ways in less than one second, and we were being so specific that no one could meet those requirements. Those were requirements the library felt would be useful to parliamentarians or staff who use it a lot. So those are the things we changed to make sure, when we went back out with the second RFP, people would be able to bid and meet the requirements, because the first one wasn't fair. No one could do it, and they were being eliminated on the basis of items that didn't have to be mandatory. They were nice things to have, but they could have been removed.

So in the second RFP people were able to bid and meet the requirements on what was mandatory for the system. The problem came with the technical definitions. I can only say that we were advised between the first and the second that the way it had been rewritten would be okay with the tribunal and there was no issue.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: By whom?

Mr. François LeMay: By people in the House who advise us in the technical area.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Who are these people?

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Are they the same people who advised you on the first RFP?

Mr. François LeMay: They're the people running the ISD. I would not be able to give you names just now, but there were meetings with these people. We could go back and identify these people.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: No, I'm not interested in that. Are they the same people who advised us on the first RFP, and we took their advice on the second RFP?

Mr. François LeMay: I wasn't in on the first RFP, so I can't tell you if they were the same people.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: It's the same office, though.

Mr. François LeMay: It's the same office.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Okay. They messed it up for us the first time, but we took their advice the second time.

Mr. François LeMay: The decision the first time was not rendered on the technical issues.

Á (1150)

Mr. Richard Paré: It was not on the technical the first time.

Mr. François LeMay: Had we proceeded, we would probably have learned a lesson the first time.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: Where we go from here I think is the important thing.

Mr. François LeMay: The Library of Parliament is the only subscriber to this service with the amount of information you have access to. All the other departments are basically looking at one topic. If you go to Fisheries, you're getting everything in the press that deals with fisheries and very little else. If you go to Environment, they'll be asking for everything on the environment, so their database is small. When we got in the system with this vendor, we asked for a lot more, because, essentially, we're taking 95% of everything in the press and finding a way of indexing it so that you have access to any topic of interest to parliamentarians.

There was no issue when we first started, because the other departments' files were small. If you had the name of the member and the topic, you'd only have two files stored in the system, and the system could take it. We were growing so fast that we realized that was one of the problems. The supplier had trouble resolving it and worked at it. Before going out to the RFP, we asked him to amend it, to try to improve the system. We were not sure he'd be able to. We gave him a month, and he had not resolved it, so we decided to move on with the RFP to make sure we would keep giving the best system possible to parliamentarians.

In the meantime we still had the maintenance contract with him. He does all the updates or improvements for all the departments. And he found the solution. The House came back saying, with the changes they have made, instead of filing the same article 25 times, you file it only once. You reduce your filing system by a lot. The issue of not having enough storage memory was gone. Now you have a system that is very efficient. We just did a survey, and everyone seems to be satisfied with it. We were looking to see if there was something out there that was a better application. That is why we were looking out there, because we had been told that this system would crash, and that we did not want.

Ms. Marlene Catterall: I think the important thing is how we move forward and create the right foundation for whatever we're going to want to do over the next few years in information technology. There are many other issues for this committee to deal with, but I think this is a foundation issue.

Personally, I would also like to get a briefing on what's happening in the Library of Parliament and the restoration concerning the provision of capacity for electronic services. But that's another issue.

It does seem to me that if the committee is still concerned about how this proceeded, and I am, we need to get a complete history of what's gone on here. If nothing else, it'll give us a briefing on what the library has done with electronic information services to MPs and what base we're starting from. I'm not quite sure how to phrase that, but I think we do need to have a little more of the history here, how we came to have the particular provider we have, whether that is a satisfactory arrangement, and so on. This is not a new case. This is essentially the same case Corel fought the government on a few years ago, going in front of the CITT when we went through a proposal call. It ended up costing us money. It hasn't in this case, except for our direct costs, but it could become a fairly expensive process if we don't get a handle on this. I think we need a little bit more from the chief librarian to respond to the concerns of the committee.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Ms. Lill.

Ms. Wendy Lill (Dartmouth, NDP): Thank you.

I echo some of Ms. Catterall's concern about this being a foundation issue. The kinds of services we're offering parliamentarians are certainly affected by the decisions you make with contracts.

I'm concerned about the whole issue of trade challenges being brought against the Library of Parliament for their choices in information gathering. I find it very worrisome, and as a member of the heritage committee, I wonder about that whole category of information retrieval and at what point it is exempt from trade deals. That's a larger issue, and it's one you may be concerned about yourself as a cultural institution. I don't know where this company is from. Maybe you can let me know when you answer where the company that's taking you to the Canadian International Trade Tribunal is headquartered and why they feel the need to be going after you on that level.

One of the things I have heard over and over from other MPs and from various sources is that the Library of Parliament is under-resourced, while more and more tasks are being assigned to it. So whenever we see something like this, it's just more discouragement, because you know there are not enough resources to begin with, and now you're dealing with this kind of thing. As a parliamentarian, I want to ask how you feel the research needs of parliamentarians are being taken care of at present, whether you think they have been diminished over the last five or six years because of cutbacks, and whether certain choices are being made that make it not as easy for members of Parliament to get the kind of information they need, for opposition members to do rigorous research and keep the whole engine of democracy working.

Á (1155)

Mr. Richard Paré: You referred to resources and asked whether we need more. We have always tried to provide the best service with the resources we have at the best cost we can find.

As to libraries being under the trade tribunal, this is, in fact, a question, because the House and the Senate are excluded from chapter 5 of the trade tribunal and the library is included. Only six provinces are included under chapter 5; excluded are Quebec, Saskatchewan, B.C., and the Ontario legislatures do not appear in any of the annexes. So we question that too, because we see it as something special. We are reviewing this matter, and we will see if there's any action that could be taken.

As to the research, as you know, we were provided with more research support last year. We have had 11 research officers identified as support for committees; we hired these people during the last fiscal year. Now we have a full establishment, and we expect that we can provide improved service to the committees, and also to the individual members, because there's a relationship between the two. Members ask individual questions also to research officers, and even with this committee now, we have research officers to advise.

Ms. Wendy Lill: I'd like to follow up on your comment about the fact that the House of Commons and the Senate are both excluded from chapter 5 of the trade tribunal and the Library of Parliament isn't. I think that's an astounding fact, and I don't understand it. How is it that the library would be caught in that net, whereas the institutions it serves and is mandated to are not? I think that is something we should be very concerned about as the overseeing joint committee.

With resources, I do see quite a distinction between servicing committees with your researchers and servicing MPs; it's a very different function altogether. What are the resources available to me and everyone around this table individually to call up the Library of Parliament now and get quality research done in a timely fashion? How is that significantly different from the way it was five years ago? Are we going to see it improve, because I've heard that it's not improving?

Mr. Richard Paré: I refer to the feedback and the reports we receive. I would say the level of satisfaction is as high as it was five years ago. There may be more complex questions coming from the members, although I'm not the one who's looking at the questions, so it takes more time sometimes. So you may have more negotiation on the deadline. This may be a factor that's come with the researchers. We also provide, of course, at information and reference, quick information, and even there we have more complex questions than we had before, less of a factual nature, because of all the information that is available on the intranet, the local area network of Parliament. But I hope the quality is always the same. I see more results when people are satisfied, but I'm sure the people at the research branch deal with complaints right away.

Â (1200)

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Mr. Telegdi.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi (Kitchener—Waterloo, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

I guess the more the discussion goes on, the more people tune in. I really am concerned about the whole information technology section and support on the Hill. I would like to get the specifications you were looking for with the search engine. I think we should maybe have those people come before this committee, because there's been quite a level of frustration in trying to get a support platform for something as simple as the BlackBerry, which many members have in this House. If the support platform were there, we would be able to access information directly.

Marlene talked about Corel getting shafted. Here was a Canadian company, and it seems that at times it becomes more difficult for Canadian companies to bid on stuff than for others.

I think it's going to be necessary to have IT people come here and talk to us, but I would definitely like to have the specifications you required for the search engine, because that's very critical. Given the rapid movement in global technology today, if they could set it up properly, Ken could sit in the back row in the House of Commons, could put it in an e-mail, and get a response back, or you could do a search into the library.

Mr. Ken Epp: I have to e-mail my staff, who do the work and relay it to me.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: You should be able to go directly into the library, and the BlackBerry is--

Mr. Ken Epp: I don't think I would even want to do that with the library. You want to have a little laptop computer at your station if you're going to get into that.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: No, you'd be quite amazed at the new stuff with the BlackBerry. If I want a piece of information and I'm sitting there, I don't think I should have to e-mail somebody to have them look it up in the library and send it to me. A lot of information I could get directly.

But I don't know if you can even help us with that. We're will have to get the IT people. I would still like to get the specifications you put out there for the search engine. I would like to have that sent to us. I think it's very important that we make sure Canadian companies get a fair crack at this stuff. Too often I see American companies picking up contracts that Canadian companies can do, and do better. When IT people from my community were up here, all they said was, if we're as good as the competition, give us a chance at it. They said this back in 1994, and the problem keeps recurring. So we've got to find out what the problem is. I sure as heck would like to have the capability to be able to access the library sitting at my desk in Parliament.

Mr. Richard Paré: On the specifications of the search engine, we will take action and provide the information.

On gaining access directly to the library, I think it's a matter more of technology and communications. I think it's a decision that would be taken in the House and in the Senate, if they want to have direct access to information from the library.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: I have a wireless communication device, and many members of Parliament and Senate have it. So if we're sitting in the chamber and can get that information directly on our little machine, that will be very good. It would be a very useful tool for me.

Mr. Richard Paré: I'll take note of that and we'll pursue it.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Senator Beaudoin.

Senator Gérald Beaudoin (Rigaud, PC): Thank you, Madam Chair.

It's not an easy task to make a judgment when you don't know all the facts, but I gather from what you have said that the whole thing was before an administrative tribunal and the tribunal awarded some judgment for damages. This is the explanation for what has taken place. Now you are going back to your system, the present one, and you want to improve it for the future. I agree entirely that we must always improve a system of that nature, but what I would say is that we have to be very careful at the moment of the call for offers. It seems to me that there is a certain indecision in what is reported. Do you have your own legal advisor in the library?

Â (1205)

Mr. Richard Paré: In this case, yes, we had one. For the case before the tribunal we hired a lawyer to deal with the complaints.

Senator Gérald Beaudoin: What was the opinion of the legal advisor?

Mr. Richard Paré: The legal advice we had made good comments and we had a good case, but the decision of the CITT.... He is the one, for instance, who said the maximum was $100,000 that we could ask of the company.

Senator Gérald Beaudoin: They came to that conclusion.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes. We hired professional lawyers from a firm.

Senator Gérald Beaudoin: But you are before this committee to report on what has taken place.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes.

Senator Gérald Beaudoin: For the future, that's another thing, of course. It's in your hands. You may have a very good plan for the future, but it has to be put on the table very clearly.

Mr. Richard Paré: As I said in the letter in September, the plan is that when we go for an RFP, you can be sure that we will meet all the requirements of the CITT and the AIT. I can assure you of that. It has never been the intention of the library to not meet the requirements of the tribunal. We will follow the recommendation.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Mr. Pickard.

Mr. Jerry Pickard (Chatham—Kent Essex, Lib.): Thank you.

Madam Chair, I really see the quandary here. Times are changing, technology has changed what the library was doing and where it was going. It was trying to provide a service, but possibly, the expectations of the service and the nature of what you'd like to provide were more expensive than you had dollars to do. You put out a plan to provide us with the best service, but didn't have the resources to back it up, and maybe, because of the speed at which things change and the ability of people to deal in that realm of information, you got caught in the void. It appears that's what's happened. I think it is unfortunate. Everybody around this table sees it as unfortunate. To spend $40,000 on a $15,000 project is scary, but I guess the lessons are learned and the structure is there. It may in the long term save us a lot.

What is being said here is, we've learned the lesson, we have things in place, but again, things are going to change in 2 or 3 or 4 years. Possibly, at that time—it's a broader problem than just the library—the government has to be looking at procurements on a much broader scale, with professional advice on accounting, dealing with lawyers, dealing with experts in trade negotiations, so that we have a system where once you put your prospectus together, it can flow through some check body. I don't know if that's a recommendation we could make, but I think it's a broader problem than just a few people in one department. From what Marlene has said, from the problems we've had with Corel, from other problems that will come—and I'm certain they do come on a monthly or annual basis—we need experts to look at some of these contracts to make sure we're heading in the right direction. So I would ask if you have resources to fall back on in the government that would support a broader scale of getting clarifications and up-to-date technology. Two years from today it's going to be very different again.

Â (1210)

Mr. Richard Paré: You're right. You make a good point. The library, being a small organization, doesn't have all the experts you mentioned within it. We consult, and when we consult, we ask for support from departments or agencies of the House and the Senate. We always ask for their support. We have lawyers, but the specialists for contracts and so on we don't have.

Mr. Jerry Pickard: What I'm wondering about is a system like that within the Treasury Board of the federal government. Would there be resources that you could fall back on to clarify any problems that may be there before you move on?

Mr. Richard Paré: It has happened that we have those supports from time to time. We have to implement what they call accrual comptrollership or something like that, and then we don't have the resources. They provided support for us to implement that in the administration of the library. Sometimes we can have an arrangement, an agreement like that.

Mr. Jerry Pickard: Is there any reason you wouldn't have it all the time?

Mr. Richard Paré: Perhaps we could have more. Maybe we should ask for more. Maybe that's what we should do. That's a good point.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Monsieur Bélanger.

[Translation]

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I have a few questions which I am going to put to you quickly.

Firstly, Mr. Paré, would it be possible to send a copy of your September 2001 note to the members of the committee who do not have one?

Mr. Richard Paré: I will give it to the clerk so that he can distribute it.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Was correspondence exchanged between you and the people who advised you, not legally speaking because there may be a confidentiality issue, but at the technical level, and could we have a copy of that?

Mr. Richard Paré: I don't have that in my files, but I will check.

[English]

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: In the early eighties I fought a battle for years, and finally won it, over the notion of using, when you're contracting or calling for tenders for proposals, generics rather than brand names. Whether the library is included or excluded under NAFTA, I think it should do the right thing and call for generics. My information is that between the first RFP and the second it was the same problem. The first RFP had the brand names involved, and P & L Communications fought that. For whatever reason, the library pulled back on the first RFP and came back with the second, which had the same thing. That's when that person went to the CITT. So I think this is a red herring, the notion of whether it should be excluded or not, because whether it is or not, I think it should still call for generic in its RFPs, as opposed to brand names.

[Translation]

You say that in the request for proposals, you had drawn up a budget of between $60,000 and $80,000.

Mr. Richard Paré: That is what we had forecast in the budget.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: And how many years was the request for?

Mr. Richard Paré: I don't think we had set a number of years.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: But the amount of $60,000 to $80,000 is an annual amount. So it was open-ended; it wasn't just for a year.

Â (1215)

Mr. François LeMay: The amount of $60,000 is what we felt would be needed on a yearly basis in the years to come, but it should be said that we had talked about a three-year contract. In fact, I think that this is a question which was put to us. I don't have the details, but I can tell you that this question had been raised. We were wondering if we should ask for a three-year contract, because the initial proposal for the first year can be much higher than for subsequent years because things have to be set up the first year, and only have to be maintained in the following years.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: So the intent was to tender a contract for several years.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: In your note of May 2, Mr. Paré, you said, and I quote: “The Library must also pay for its own legal fees, which amount to a total of $15,842.” Today, you referred to an amount of approximately $40,000. Are you talking about both amounts together?

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes, that's it.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: The Library did not pay more than $15,000 to its lawyers.

Mr. Richard Paré: That is what we paid.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: So that adds up to $40,000. But you say—

Mr. Richard Paré: We had estimated that it would cost us between $50,000 and $60,000.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: It cost you $40,000 for one year, but you had a multi-year contract. So there was nothing to stop you from spending that in the second year, since you had budgeted for that.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Madam Chair, I have a last series of questions concerning Densan. May we have a copy of the initial contract which was signed between the Library and Densan?

Mr. Richard Paré: We can look at that if you wish.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Is it a document which is publicly available?

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes, I'll see if I have it in my files.

[English]

No, it's not on the service.

[Translation]

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I have some reservations about the fact that a company may possibly continue to provide services year after year without competition, it would seem. I would like to know what the contractual agreements are between the Library of Parliament of Canada and the Densan company.

Mr. Richard Paré: I believe it is a service agreement.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I'm convinced that we will be able to demonstrate that the rules have been respected.

Mr. Richard Paré: It is simply a service agreement.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I'm wondering about something. I know that below a certain amount, you don't have to put out a call for tenders, but aren't these things cumulative? If the cumulative amount of what is paid to a company over three or four years goes beyond the threshold which is supposed to trigger a call for tenders... What are the rules in this regard, or can we say that the Library does not have any rules in that regard?

Mr. Richard Paré: We follow Treasury Board rules.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: So, you are bound by Treasury Board rules.

Mr. Richard Paré: We always follow Treasury Board rules. This is a service agreement and if we are satisfied with the service provided by our supplier, we use the same supplier from year to year, over a period of two, three or four years. Since it is a service agreement and we are satisfied, I don't see why we would change and call for tenders. It is because we had a problem in the database that we were asked to do that. We mustn't mix things up, Mr. Bélanger.

This is a service we offer parliamentarians, which costs so much per year and which we keep because it works well. We are not considering changing it. At this time, the main reason we are not putting out a new request for proposals is that the service we provide meets all of the requirements. As I was saying earlier, I think that the situation will have to be reviewed in two or three years. Things will then be different.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I must admit that I don't know those regulations well enough and that I will have to look into them, but it seems to me that a public institution has to be more accountable than a private one. Among other things, you can't continue to award service contracts to the same company without giving other companies the possibility of competing on bids to offer the same service. That is the basic principle I follow. I wonder if the Library meets that requirement.

Mr. Richard Paré: We meet requirements, but when we have a service that works well, we don't tend to solicit another. We try to maintain it to provide good service to parliamentarians.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: When government of Canada agencies have an external audit of their books done and when everything is fine, they are still bound to periodically request proposals. Libraries elsewhere also do that. Colleges and universities do that. As far as I know, public institutions must periodically call for tenders, even if they are satisfied with the service being provided to them by a private company. At what point will other companies be able to bid in order to compete with Densan? There are several other companies that offer the same services in Ottawa or in Canada, but they are being kept out because you are satisfied. I think this issue may need to be reviewed.

Mr. Richard Paré: Obviously, when we make a request for proposals, all interested companies will be able to submit an offer. We will then have more stringent requirements than the ones we have for the services we are providing currently. Over the next few years, we will probably have much more precise profiles for parliamentarians.

Â (1220)

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: I would like to make one last comment, Madam Chair.

[English]

I brought this up at the very first meeting we had of this committee. It took an incredibly long time for this committee to get going. Then it took another rather long time to get the material, which is incomplete. Madam Co-Chair, you know I had to write in order to finally get this jarred loose. I hope the information that has been requested collectively here today won't take as long to get, even though we're probably not going to meet for a little while.

Thank you.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

Ms. Lill.

Ms. Wendy Lill: Thank you.

I want to pick up on one comment from Mr. Bélanger, because I agree that the whole issue of brand names versus generic is an important one that should be respected in any calls for proposals.

I would like to ask whether you, as the former parliamentary secretary of Heritage, have any understanding of why it is that the parliamentary library is included in chapter 5, whereas the House and the Senate aren't? It's a curious issue. I would like to know if we could have a briefing on that, because it's an important issue you're dealing with. The health of your very existence depends on understanding where you are in respect of the international trade environment.

Mr. Mauril Bélanger: Let me answer the question on the record, Madam Chair. I do not know, and it was considerably outside the purview of whatever responsibilities I had as PS to the Minister of Heritage.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): We could maybe look into that, Wendy, and find somebody who could explain it to us.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Monsieur Paré, maybe you can send a circular around to let us know in answer to Ms. Lill's question. Thank you.

Mr. Telegdi.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: I'm very surprised that the service contracts go on and on. Municipal councils regularly put out requests for bids. You do that to ensure that it's the marketplace that determines how you get the most efficient service at the lowest cost.

How soon can you provide the information we have requested? And could you repeat for me what the specifications for searching the database were?

Mr. Richard Paré: You want the specifications for the search engine?

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: Yes. You mentioned the matter while you were talking, so I just want to make sure I got you correctly.

Mr. Richard Paré: And you mentioned that you want to have information about the specifications for the search engine.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: You mentioned, I think, that you had to search your database.

Mr. Richard Paré: Yes.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: Can you repeat what you told the committee? I suppose I could wait until I get them.

Â (1225)

Mr. François LeMay: I think I'm the one who answered that. I gave it as an example, not as a specific. I think I said something about being able to search 20 different names in less than two seconds, or something like that. I wouldn't say that is in the specifications. There are two distinct elements. One was the requirements for the library, which were not grand, but were just a hub, a system at the front. The other we're looking at in the technical specifications we can provide to you. We can provide you with the RFP, in fact, if that would be better for you.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: How quickly can you get it to committee?

Mr. François LeMay: It is posted on MERX, and we can get it to you tomorrow if that's how quickly you require it. It's not something we have to rewrite, it exists.

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: Very good, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): Thank you.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): It would maybe be helpful to know what the various rules are from Treasury Board or whatever, and also what the library does with other contracts, consultants, those kind of things. What is the normal operating procedure for contracts? I guess what I want to know is whether things have changed since all of this and what we have learned from it. I apologize that we just pressed on today, knowing the person who really had the file was out of the country, but thinking we might not meet and it was really important, because I hoped that what we would be able to focus on today was the future. How do we make sure this never happens again? I didn't quite understand, as I hadn't read it carefully enough, that we weren't dealing with the same people and that there would still be some of these loose ends, as far as the committee was concerned. So we will talk and see what we can organize as next steps.

I'm still interested in the international comparisons, and maybe now we have some researchers, we can look at how the budget of your library ranks internationally in respect of ability in IT, but also in research capacity. Wendy Lill and I agree that the scrutiny role of Parliament over what government does is very much based on the calibre and quality of the people we have in our research branch, and I would like to know about recruitment and retention. I know Donald Savoie feels that capacity in public administration within the Library of Parliament is an extraordinarily important thing. He says that of his ten counterparts who are the experts in public administration two work in the Library of Congress. I think we, as parliamentarians, need to take our job as the scrutiny of government very seriously, and I would like to know what the capacity of our research branch is compared to the rest of the world. My instinct is that even if we're leading, we need more, because I think we can't take this democracy too seriously, and it is about the cynicism and apathy Canadians have towards government. If we don't take it seriously, they're going to give up on us. So maybe over the summer we could see some of those international things. I'd like to see recruitment and retention statistics, and I'd like to see the salary categories: are we able to pay people of the calibre we want? It's just too important for us not to be doing it properly.

Andrew.

Â (1230)

Mr. Andrew Telegdi: My understanding is that at some point we're going to have the IT people in, because that's fairly critical for us.

The Joint Chair (Senator Vivienne Poy): I think we should.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Andrew, as you know, we're about to embark on this small project with Wendy and the disabilities committee on e-consultation on CPP disability, and we've watched as the name for it goes from a pilot to a scoping exercise to all these ways of worrying that it's too costly, or too much work, or too many people, or all of that. I feel that when you watch people lose confidence that we'll be able to pull it off, it speaks to the past rather than the future. We need to be able to do these things with Canadians, and I hope this committee will have the ability to bring in the people who could empower committees to be in touch with Canadians electronically. There's a whole bunch of other stuff we might want to do, and it's up to this committee to see what's possible and what's being done around the world.

Mr. Jerry Pickard: Madam Chair, I laud your comments, and I think having people and budgets large enough to handle those things is very important, but we do have a bit of a problem, as everyone around this table knows. I, again, would look at department salaries and how they operate, research people there, then look at our own in the House of Commons and in the Senate. Our competitive nature is somewhat less than any other place I know, coming off the Hill and going into many businesses locally. We can't compete in salaries. We've got very dedicated people who do a tremendous job, and it's almost through pure dedication that a lot of that work is done as well as it is. I'm not sure how we can handle that, because there are so many different strings that pull each organization in this government and control salaries. We get into contract negotiations, we get into limited resources that all of us have. Are we tracking in an area we can actually make a change in? That's the only question I throw out on that.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): I think you can't, unless you do proper studies on recruitment and retention. You have to know why people are coming here to work, why they're leaving, and what they're leaving to. If people are leaving to an academic appointment where they won't be making any more money, maybe it's something else. We've got to figure out how we change the culture . But I also think, particularly on the citizen engagement side and the ability of parliamentarians to do this, the government departments are much better resourced than Parliament.

Also, there are some ethical challenges, because some of those government departments, like HRDC on our CPP, would love to be able to give us some money to do our job properly, but that's not optically correct, because of the separation. Is there some sort of third party way we could do that? I think we need to explore our role in evaluating public administration and saving the government money, if we do our jobs properly, by just knowing what works and what doesn't work and getting it organized. It's no secret that's why I wanted to be part of this committee. When you look at the congressmen, you see the number of staff they have in their offices with research capacity, the budget that allows them to travel or do whatever.

I just want to know what the reality is. It's up to the committee to decide what we want to push for or not push for or all of that. But I think we want to know where we sit in all of this in the context of vibrant democracy.

Mr. Epp.

Â (1235)

Mr. Ken Epp: Madam Chair, if I can interrupt, I really regret doing this, but I have an appointment, which, with my travel time, means I must leave. My apologies.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): No, we're going. And I apologize also to Monsieur Paré.

Mr. Richard Paré: That's okay.

Just to refer to what Mr. Pickard was saying about the research, of course, we cannot compare with the private sector, we cannot compete, but for the public service, we are at the same level if we include the number of hours we work yearly. We work 1820 hours and they work 1950 hours. So if you take that into account, we are comparable with public service research.

Also, to the committee, any documentation you want or information about the process we have for contracts and so on we will be pleased to provide.

The Joint Chair (Ms. Carolyn Bennett): Maybe we'll give you our shopping list.

Thank you very much for coming. We will see what we can organize, hopefully before Parliament rises.