Poilievre asks RCMP to criminally investigate ArriveCan debacle – National | 24CA News
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has despatched a letter to the RCMP asking the commissioner to increase an investigation into the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) to incorporate the problem-plagued ArriveCAN app.
The request comes a day after Auditor General Karen Hogan launched a blistering report on the pandemic-era program, calling it the worst monetary file retaining she has ever seen.
In his letter dated Tuesday to commissioner Mike Duheme, Poilievre stated Hogan’s findings have “exposed corruption, mismanagement and misconduct on a massive scale.”
The auditor basic didn’t use the phrase “corruption” in her findings and stated it was as much as the police to resolve if what occurred was legal.
But she did slam this system for its “glaring disregard for basic management and contracting practices.”
She estimates the value tag was roughly $59.5 million, however stated the mission was so badly managed it’s unattainable to tally the ultimate quantity.
Poilievre known as the dealing with of the ArriveCAN “completely unacceptable.”
“There were also severe violations of the Canada Border Services Agency Code of Conduct, including failure to disclose whiskey tastings and extravagant dinners paid for by lobbyists and private interests.”
Poilievre raised his letter to the RCMP in query interval Tuesday and attacked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for what he has dubbed “ArriveScam.”
In his first feedback since Hogan’s stories, Trudeau acknowledged he “and all Canadians expect public servants to follow [the] rules” however stated MPs shouldn’t instruct police on what to analyze.
“We will encourage the RCMP to do its work, but it doesn’t take politicians, even leaders of the Opposition to tell the RCMP to do their job,” stated the prime minister.
Global News has reached out to the RCMP for remark.
The CBSA says it’s trying into what unfolded, and referred a part of the probe to the RCMP.
Ottawa launched the app in April 2020 to trace well being and speak to data for folks getting into Canada. But it led to lengthy waits at airports, technical glitches, and compelled 1000’s of individuals to quarantine by mistake.
Last January, the Globe and Mail printed a report detailing the bungled contracting course of: Ottawa IT agency GCstrategies, which the federal government employed to construct ArriveCAN, subcontracted the work to 6 different firms.
The auditor basic estimated the typical per diem for an ArriveCAN exterior contractor was $1,090, almost double what a Government of Canada worker would obtain.
The federal authorities’s reliance on non-competitive contracts with exterior corporations finally drove up costs, Hogan discovered.
—With information from Global’s Aaron D’Andrea and the Canadian Press
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