During a committee meeting on the ArriveCAN scandal on Nov. 9, an official from Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) confirmed that the agency had forwarded an email from two subcontractors to the Department of Justice, as the two had lied about their work relationship with an IT company co-founder.
Conservative MP Larry Brock revealed during the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates that Botler AI co-founder Rikita Dutt had raised concerns in a May 10 email to Public Services and Procurement Canada Supply Specialist Anita Chan.
The email said that Coradix and Dalian, two subcontractors involved in the ArriveCAN project, had utilized the names of both Ms. Dutt and Botler co-founder Amir Morv as resources without obtaining their knowledge or consent, and subsequently received payments from the federal government.
Mr. Brock said the companies had also falsely claimed that they sought the input of the Botler co-founders, but an access to information request to the Canada Border Service Agency (CBSA) later revealed this was false. When Ms. Dutt filed a legal notice for the contractors to produce the document, they also failed to comply.
“There are elements of criminality in that email, that not only is there a potential breach of contract and regulations with respect to the [Task Authorization], but then we have elements of fraud and forgery,” Mr. Brock said. “Did you get a sense that there was a red flag in this and whether or not you passed this on to the [Department of Justice] for consultation?”
Modified Resumés
The committee is examining how the companies GC Strategies, Dalian, and Coradix received millions of taxpayer dollars to develop the ArriveCAN app, which was used by Ottawa to track the COVID-19 vaccination status of travellers visiting Canada. Critics have claimed the app could have been developed for a fraction of its $54 million cost.
When asked about this, Mr. Firth claimed while he had only received one version of Mr. Morv and Ms. Dutt’s resumés, he had modified them into several versions that fit an “evaluation matrix” of scores needed to be compliant in a certain category of government contracts, and accidentally sent the “wrong version” of the resumés to the government which was then used for the task authorization.
Mr. Brock told Ms. Chan that Mr. Firth’s explanation was an “illogical fantasy,” as he had modified the Botler co-founders work experience on five or six occasions so that they would qualify.
“That is not only forgery, that is fraud. So my question to you is why did you not just shut down immediately, this operation between GC Strategies, Coradix, and Dalian and against the spectre of criminality?” he asked.
Ms. Chan said from what they observed, Dalian and Coradix had obtained the resumés from GC Strategies, but there was “nothing out of the ordinary with the contractors.”
When NDP MP Gord Johns asked if PSPC had determined how fraudulent resumés were accepted for a task authorization, PSPC Procurement Branch Assistant Deputy Minister Michael Mills said the CBSA and RCMP were both conducting investigations into the matter.
“I will say that we are very concerned, very interested in ensuring the integrity of the procurement system,” Mr. Mills said. “We are looking at these instruments, we’re looking at all of our professional services, contracting mechanisms, to look at how can we ensure that they are above reproach, that they are effective and that they don’t allow these kinds of things to happen in the future.”
