Shared Services Canada, the federal IT agency, identified 329 conflicts of interest among its employees last year, according to a cabinet briefing note.
Blacklock's Reporter says the findings shed light on concerns about public servants moonlighting as contractors, a practice described as “fairly common” in federal departments.
“Employees are to report all outside employment, activities, assets, and interests,” stated the September 26 note titled Conflict Of Interest. Of the reported conflicts, 44% involved “outside activities,” though no further details were provided.
One past case involved a full-time Shared Services analyst who served as the director of a Vancouver-based green technology company that successfully obtained a $10,735 federal grant.
“Shared Services Canada offers in-house values and ethics training at all levels,” the note added. The Values And Ethics Code For The Public Sector requires managers to take “all possible steps to prevent and resolve any real, apparent, or potential conflicts of interest.”
Concerns about insider contracting have prompted parliamentary scrutiny. The Commons public accounts committee narrowly voted 6 to 5 last March to request a ban on federal employees engaging in insider contracting.
The motion followed testimony from David Yeo, an IT specialist at the Department of National Defence earning $98,000 annually, who also served as CEO of Dalian Enterprises Inc., a defence contractor that received $91 million in military contracts. Both Yeo and his company were later suspended.
Conservative MP Michael Barrett (Leeds-Grenville, Ont.) questioned Yeo during testimony, asking whether “double-dipping” was widespread among public servants. “Well, I would assume there are lots of people in the public service who have companies outside of the public service,” Yeo responded.
“You think that’s quite common?” asked Barrett. “I think it is fairly common, yes,” Yeo replied.
When pressed by Liberal MP Shaun Chen (Scarborough North, Ont.) on why he believed federal employees ran side businesses, Yeo cited financial pressures: “Our taxation system and everything being so expensive with inflation and everything else, whether you are a government employee or someone else not working with the government, there is likely a chance you might have something else on the side to help pay the bills and put groceries on your table.”
Despite these revelations, then-Comptroller General Roch Huppé told the public accounts committee that no government-wide estimate exists of how many federal employees engage in outside contracting. “Government-wide, I don’t have that information,” testified Huppé.
