Jeff Kibble

“Mr. Speaker, as it is a new session, it is always an honour to recognize that I am so pleased to stay in the House for the good people of Calgary Midnapore and speak on their behalf. I cannot commence this speech without paying recognition to the tragedy that took place at CFB Wainwright. As the mother of a teenage son, I cannot imagine the pain these families are feeling right now, and I want them to know that my thoughts, my prayers and my heart are with them. I also want them to know that Shaun, Aidan, Morgan and Hayden were not just the sons of Canada, they were also the sons of Alberta. It is very poignant that this horrific event would happen on the eve of a referendum to decide Alberta’s destiny within Canada. I am very happy to say that Albertans chose to be with Canada, because I believe that is a better destiny for us as Albertans. I also believe it shows that what happens in Alberta touches all of Canada. All those who serve know what it means to take accountability, so that is what I am going to be talking about today: the implementation of Bill C-40 and the need for responsibility and accountability. Bill C-40 would transform the Defence Investment Agency into a Crown corporation. This is good for many reasons. It would give the organization greater authority to negotiate, to manage and to fast-track projects, which we hope would result in quicker outcomes for both our armed men and women and for Canadians. However, as the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility, and Bill C-40, I am afraid, would take away some of the responsibility and some of the accountability. It would do this by creating an arm’s-length organization, by creating winners and losers and an opportunity for Liberals to reward friends and insiders, and by eliminating fiscal and procurement oversight. The first way Bill C-40 would eliminate accountability is by creating yet another arm’s-length organization. There are countless times I have been told by a minister in committee that they cannot respond to that question or they cannot answer my query because it is an arm’s-length organization. They wash their hands of it, yet all of these organizations have an impact on Canadians’ lives and all of these organizations spend the Canadian taxpayer’s dollar. They should be completely accountable, both in the committee and in the House of Commons. We have seen some of the most heinous misuse of funds in the history of the 11-year Liberal government by arm’s-length organizations. For example, the Canada Infrastructure Bank has committed $18 billion since 2017, and in 10 years, despite this high expenditure, fewer than 10% of projects have been completed. Despite that, executives were given both bonuses and salaries to the tune of $8.6 million last year. We cannot forget the green slush fund, Sustainable Development Technology Canada. The damning 2024 Auditor General report found 90 instances where directors failed to recuse themselves for a contract total of $76 million. Out of 58 projects, 10 projects were determined to be ineligible under their own rules, totalling $59 million. Another $20 million in seed projects was approved without the required screening. It was so bad that the federal government had to disband the organization, and every single board of directors member was forced to resign. The second reason Bill C-40 leaves a wanting for accountability and responsibility is that it has pieces of legislation that would create winners and losers, which would allow Liberals to reward friends and insiders. It would expand the number of categories under which the minister could carry out a sole-source procurement. There would be 13 opportunities, in fact, with no options, no price comparisons and no comparative evaluations. It would also allow any number of future exceptions to be written into regulations, as many as they want. It would exclude the minister from the consequences of outsourcing and these can be many and can be highly impactful, from overspending and choosing projects and solutions that are out of scope, to solutions that are wrong for operational requirements. It would also allow the minister to exclude anyone without justification, without oversight and without explanation; procurement ghosting; picking winners and losers; and giving contracts to friends and insiders. We saw this no place better than in the Auditor General’s report in 2024 of McKinsey, with 10 departments being implicated and 97 professional service contracts for a total of $209 million. These rules would allow Liberals to give money to friends and insiders and they would allow the government to do what it loves to do best, and that is to play favourites. Bill C-40 would also allow the corporation to withdraw up to $1 billion out of the consolidated revenue fund, and not just once but as many times as it needed to, yet the oversight would be missing. The DIA would be under Treasury Board rules to a substantially less extent than prior to Bill C-40, Treasury Board being the body that provides the oversight for the expenditure of funds. This would mean less regulatory oversight for the spending of taxpayer dollars, something Conservatives never like to see occurring. The bill would remove the oversight of the Office of the Procurement Ombud, who audits the execution of government contracting to check for process. The procurement ombud said that he is concerned about the potential for less accountability when it comes to major defence contracts, and he has good cause for concern. In April 2024 testimony regarding the McKinsey contracting study, he stated: We are seeing consistent problems across the federal procurement landscape. If you go back even as far as a decade and further, you’ll see that many of these issues are repetitive in nature. It’s not simply one issue, but what I will say—and this is what I believe the theme for this report is—that perhaps the system has lost confidence in delivering results for the project authority. As a result, people use the system in ways that it shouldn’t be used. This is something that we are trying to avoid. In February 2024, in his testimony on ArriveCAN, the procurement ombud stated: ...the number one issue...is documentation. This is not unique to [just] these departments [that were included in this analysis and this study]. This is a struggle across the federal government. In his 2025-26 annual report, the procurement ombud stated, specific to defence procurement: Major defence procurements are high-value, high-risk, and central to Canada’s sovereignty and security [, something that is so important to Canadians at this time]. Persistent delays, fragmented accountability, and weak performance measurement carry real consequences, [as we saw this week] not only for public funds, but for operational readiness. While recent reforms demonstrate positive intent, their success will depend on clear accountability, disciplined implementation, and effective oversight throughout the [procurement processes and throughout the] lifecycle of defence contracts. In these three examples, we see the necessity for accountability. Bill C-40 would take away that accountability and that responsibility by maintaining arm’s-length organizations, putting in mechanisms to allow for winners and losers that would allow Liberals to reward their friends and insiders, and removing significant financial and procurement oversight. However, the solution is found where we begin. The procurement ombud stated, “If people aren’t accountable, it creates big gaps in the process.... You do not step away from the gap and pretend it’s not your responsibility.... When you see a gap, [you say] “I take accountability and responsibility [and I will] fill that gap.” There is no place that is more critical and more fundamental to our Canadian sovereignty and to our Canadian security than our defence procurement. The Liberals should take accountability and responsibility. Those four young men who passed away deserve that.”