2023 Minister’s Transition Book 2: Overview of Public Services and Procurement Canada
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The department at a glance
Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC)’s vision is to excel in government operations. The department’s strategic outcome and mission is to deliver high-quality, central programs and services that ensure sound stewardship on behalf of Canadians and meet the program needs of federal institutions. PSPC serves federal departments and agencies as their central purchasing agent, linguistic authority, real property manager, treasurer, accountant, and pay and pension administrator. To fulfill this mandate, PSPC has over 17,000 employees and an annual gross budget of $8.8 billion, of which $4.6 billion is appropriated by Parliament and $4.2 billion is revenue. With offices in the National Capital Region (NCR) and across the country, the department achieves its mission and vision by conducting business under the following 4 core responsibilities and a range of internal services:
- procurement of goods and services
- payments and accounting
- property and infrastructure
- government-wide services and support
Acquisitions
The department:
- handles $25 billion (23,000+ transactions) of procurements annually on behalf of client departments
- leads major defence and marine procurements for the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Coast Guard
- conducts outreach to small businesses and other vendors interested in becoming government suppliers, with a specific focus on underrepresented groups, including Black-, women-, and Indigenous-owned businesses
- purchases vaccines and other supplies to respond to COVID-19
PSPC provides expert advice, guidance and support in:
- identifying the goods or services to be procured
- selecting the most effective procurement approach
- considering socio-economic factors
- developing appropriate evaluation criteria
- calling for, receiving, and evaluating bids
- developing procurement instruments, such as standing offers and supply arrangements
- negotiating and administering contracts
- contract security
- ethical business practices
Assets and infrastructure
PSPC provides federal departments and agencies with office accommodation to over 267,000 federal employees in over 1,500 Crown-owned and leased locations across Canada. With the adoption of a hybrid work environment, the department is reviewing its space requirements and modernizing office environments to support more flexible use.
The department also has responsibility for:
- the Parliamentary Precinct: stewardship, rehabilitation and modernization of Crown-owned buildings and associated lands. Current work is focussed on Centre Block and redevelopment of block 2, as well as the Indigenous Peoples’ Space at 100 Wellington
- federal laboratories: the revitalization of federal laboratories across Canada to support world-class science
- engineering assets: building, maintaining and managing infrastructure, including roads, bridges and dams across the country, as well as heating and cooling plants in the NCR
PSPC also provides contaminated site clean-up and environmental remediation, property appraisal/valuation services and engineering expertise to other government departments to help manage their assets.
Payments and accounting
PSPC collects revenues and issues payments, maintains the financial accounts of Canada, issues Government-wide financial reports, and administers payroll and pension services across the Government of Canada. PSPC ensures that public servants are paid accurately and on time, and is making progress towards reducing the backlog of pay transactions. The department continues to work with other departments and agencies to further stabilize pay administration, while work is underway to develop a new pay system.
The department:
- issues over 400 million payments annually on behalf of federal departments and agencies
- handles over $3 trillion in cash flow transactions each year
- provides pension services to over 935,000 active and retired members of 8 public sector pension plans and administers over 5.0 million pension payments totalling $14.0 billion annually
- makes payments in lieu of taxes, on behalf of departments and agencies, toward the cost of local government in communities where it owns real property (for example, office buildings, harbours, national parks)
Government services
PSPC offers services to federal institutions and Canadians as the government’s linguistic authority and common service provider:
- PSPC’s Translation Bureau provides translation and interpretation services for government and Parliamentarians. The Bureau is also working to provide quality remote interpretation services, maintain capacity to support Indigenous languages, and offer sign languages interpretation
- PSPC administers the government-wide Integrity Regime for procurement and real property transactions, which may prevent unethical suppliers from receiving Government of Canada contracts
- PSPC also manages government information services to support the delivery of media monitoring and analysis, and public opinion research and advertising contracting
- PSPC is responsible for GCSurplus and the Seized Property Management programs for sale and divestiture of surplus assets and seized assets, respectively
- the department also processes security screenings for contractors and sub-contractors requiring access to protected information
Internal services
PSPC operations are supported by a range of corporate services, including:
- human resources management
- finance management
- information management / information technology
- policy and communicationsFootnote 1:
- media relations
- speechwriting and events
- social media
- strategic communications
- proactive communications
- Cabinet and parliamentary affairsFootnote 1:
- committee support
- question period notes
Number of Public Services and Procurement Canada employees
Located in 5 geographic regions across Canada and in the NCR:
- Pacific: 598
- Western: 690
- Ontario: 680
- Quebec: 1,485
- Atlantic: 3,010
- National Capital Region: 10,920
Public Services and Procurement Canada portfolio organizations
Shared Services Canada
Responsible for digitally enabling government programs and services. It does this by providing networks and network security, data centres and cloud offerings, digital communications and information technology (IT) tools to enable the public service to effectively deliver services to Canadians.
Crown Corporations
In this section
Canada Post Corporation
- Canada Post Corporation Act mandates the establishment and operation of a postal service that meets the needs of Canadians and that conducts operations on a financially self-sustaining basis
- More than $10 billion in revenues annually
- Exclusive privilege to collect, transmit and deliver letters up to 500 grams within Canada
Canada Lands Company Limited
- Holds, develops and disposes of Government of Canada real property
- It is a shell parent Crown corporation with 3 operational subsidiaries:
- Canada Lands Company CLC Limited
- Parc Downsview Park
- Old Port of Montreal Corporation
Defence Construction Canada
- Provides infrastructure and environmental services for defence projects
- Carries out a wide range of procurement, disposal, construction, operation, maintenance and professional activities required to support the defence of Canada, with its primary clients being the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces
National Capital Commission
- Responsible for acting as the long-term planner, principle steward and a partner in the development, conservation and improvement of Canada’s National Capital Region
- Region’s largest landowner and owns 11% of all lands in the National Capital Region, which includes 6 official residences, National Capital Region interprovincial crossings and LeBreton Flats, among others
Adjudicative, regulatory and oversight bodies
- Office of the Procurement Ombudsman
- Payments in Lieu of Taxes Dispute Advisory Panel
- Federal Public Sector Labour Relations and Employment Board
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