ArriveCan contractor GC strategies faces an audit of all financial transactions received from the federal government over the last 10 years. Investigators found GC Strategies won millions of dollars in contracts without having to bid, according to government watchdog Blacklock's Reporter.The Trudeau Liberals contracted the Ontario-based company for the ArriveCan app to the tune of $59.5 million, a project officials say should have cost $80,000. Public records show GC Strategies received 55 federal contracts totaling $33.4 million in the period from 2017 to 2023, despite a company partner testifying in 2022 that total federal contracts over just two years were worth $44 million.“If there is something crooked – if, if, because we are not a court of law, but if something is not right, we have to identify it,” said Bloc Québécois MP Julie Vignola.The Commons Government Operations Committee is conducting a rigorous investigation, including the Border Services Agency, where documents have gone missing and two officials were suspended without pay earlier this week.The 10-year audit ordered by the committee followed a motion sponsored by Conservative MP Stephanie Kusie stating, “the committee request that the Auditor General conduct a performance audit on a priority basis of all payments to GC Strategies and other companies incorporated by the co-founders and all contracts with the Government of Canada.”“The RCMP have it within their purview to figure out if there is criminal activity at play,” said Liberal MP Charles Sousa. “Some are presupposing these are criminals. That hasn’t been decided. The investigation has not been completed and we need that investigation as taxpayers, as officials in government.”“GC Strategies invoiced over $44 million over the past two years for all of our federal work over 20 departments,” testified Kristian Firth, one of two employees of GC Strategies, in 2022. “We are an IT staffing firm. We are not involved. We have no direction on the projects or the objectives.”“You are the broker or the middleman between the government and the service provider, is that correct?” Conservative MP Michael Barrett asked at the 2022 hearing of the government operations committee. “Essentially yes,” replied Firth.Committee evidence including recorded phone calls by subcontractors where GC Strategies boasted it had friends who “rubbed shoulders with every deputy minister in town.” A GC Strategies partner “routinely boasted he and his friends, senior government officials with contracting authority, have ‘dirt on each other,’” witnesses testified October 26.Investigations to date by Auditor General Karen Hogan and Procurement Ombudsman Alexander Jeglic confirmed the company benefited from inside dealing that breached contracting rules. “It should be evident to everyone in this room as well as Canadians there is systemic corruption within this government,” MP Kusie earlier told the committee.
