Public Services and Procurement Canada
Plans at a glance: 2023 to 2024 Departmental Plan
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Diversity and inclusion
Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) is committed to fostering diversity and inclusion, including addressing systemic barriers and other challenges experienced among equity-seeking groups, and providing services that value diversity and combat racism.
PSPC will continue to support diversity and inclusion through its procurement activities, including those carried out by its procurement offices across Canada, and the continued implementation of the Supplier Diversity Action Plan. The department’s Supplier Diversity Program, which is a component of the action plan, will outline approaches to increase supplier diversity in PSPC-led procurements. This program will contribute to increasing the diversity of suppliers, reducing barriers, and enhancing economic and social opportunities for under-represented groups. In addition, Procurement Assistance Canada (PAC) will continue to focus on supporting smaller and diverse businesses looking to become government suppliers. As part of these efforts, PAC will continue developing events and initiatives in collaboration with diverse partners and organizations, in order to ensure they are meaningful and valuable for these partners.
As the Government of Canada’s real property expert, the department also leads government efforts towards enhancing accessibility in its built environment. As such, technical accessibility assessments of federal buildings are underway across the country to identify, prevent and remove barriers to accessibility in the built environment. PSPC will also continue the implementation of its recently developed Parliamentary Precinct Universal Accessibility Strategy and Action Plan as part of the department’s commitment to making the Parliamentary Precinct a model for universal accessibility excellence.
As the main provider for linguistic services for the Government of Canada, the Translation Bureau continues to explore additional services to ensure access to information to Canadians who are deaf, deafblind and deafened, and whose primary language of communication is American sign language or Langue des signes québécoise. In addition, the Translation Bureau will continue to promote the Guidelines for inclusive writing to ensure that Canadians have access to gender-inclusive resources in both official languages.
PSPC is also dedicated to advancing accessibility and is uniquely placed to support the implementation of the Accessible Canada Act. PSPC’s first accessibility plan, which establishes the department’s accessibility goals and targets for 2023 to 2025, brings together far-reaching initiatives, practices and strategies with the goal of making PSPC fully accessible and inclusive to its employees and to Canadians.
Reconciliation
PSPC will continue providing its clients with additional opportunities to procure goods and services from Indigenous suppliers. For example, PAC’s 6 regional offices will continue raising awareness among client departments and agencies about opportunities to procure goods and services from Indigenous suppliers. In addition, Indigenous participation plans are increasingly becoming an integral part of many large defence and marine procurements, offering employment, skills development and training opportunities for Indigenous Peoples as well as subcontracting opportunities for Indigenous businesses, among other benefits. Significant work is also underway to identify Indigenous businesses within existing procurement instruments, including those for professional services. PSPC is developing new tools and expanding guidance on the use of existing tools, such as standing offers and supply arrangements, and promoting the use of Indigenous participation plans to ensure benefits for Indigenous businesses are derived from the economic activity associated with contracts.
PAC will continue to focus on outreach activities aimed at providing support and guidance to Indigenous businesses on how to do business with the federal government, such as partnered webinars, one-on-one sessions, and mentorship activities. PAC’s efforts will be complemented by activities undertaken in PSPC’s regional offices.
Indigenous participation plans are also being developed for various real property projects. These are proactive engagement strategies that foster a better communication with Indigenous communities and allow for the integration of reconciliation in all stages of PSPC’s real property projects. As an example, Indigenous participation plans were included in the construction projects for the new Government of Canada building in Shawinigan as well as for the new Justice Complex in Montréal, Quebec.
In addition, procurements within the National Capital Region (NCR) related to the maintenance and repair of crossings, under PSPC’s responsibility, include requirements for bidders to submit Indigenous participation plans. Given the long-term nature of the operations and maintenance of bridges and related projects, and the potential for Indigenous Peoples to consider related training and careers, PSPC will support initiatives that offer skills development and training opportunities for Indigenous Peoples. For example, a pilot educational program will continue in summer 2023 whereby Indigenous youth will participate in an environmental field school with scientists, Indigenous knowledge keepers and academics. PSPC will also expand its efforts to incorporate Indigenous cultural and spiritual spaces and design influences in major PSPC-led real property projects. The department will advance a pilot project to create a GCcoworking site on a First Nations site in Fort William, Thunder Bay, Ontario.
Greening government
PSPC will continue to play an active role in the government’s activities and efforts in relation to the Greening Government Strategy, and departmental activities will be focused on the following 4 areas:
- mobility and fleets
- property and workplaces
- climate resilient services and operations
- procurement of goods and services
PSPC will continue to support departments and agencies in reducing their greenhouse gas emissions by ensuring the availability of procurement instruments for zero-emission and hybrid vehicles. The department is engaging existing manufacturers to expand their offerings, and is also seeking to onboard new manufacturers. One particular area of focus for PSPC’s procurement instruments will be the availability of light trucks, a key category of vehicles in the federal fleet.
The department will also continue to work on its Net Zero Carbon Neutral Portfolio Plan to determine the most cost-effective pathway to achieve net-zero carbon real property operations by 2050. Various projects and initiatives are underway, including major renovation projects at 25 St. Clair in Toronto, Ontario, the Lester B. Pearson Building in Ottawa, Ontario, the construction of the new data taxation centre in Shawinigan, Quebec, and the Energy Services Acquisition Program (ESAP). PSPC will work on the implementation of the ESAP’s deeper greening initiative to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and offer low-carbon energy services to more buildings in the NCR.
PSPC will also progress on the development of a strategy to better understand the risks posed by the impacts of climate change to its real property assets, services and operations, and to manage climate adaptation needs uniformly across the country in real property management, project delivery and departmental operations as well as in services to client departments and Canadians.
With respect to green procurement, PSPC will advance numerous initiatives. These will include the use of standard procurement language across PSPC procurements requiring environmentally-preferable packaging and supporting the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS) in the implementation of 2 new embodied carbon standards under the Policy on Green Procurement across the federal government. The department will also introduce carbon footprint calculators into 3 of its high-impact procurement categories. In addition, PSPC will initiate work on a multi-year project to develop a green public procurement tool for federal assets, with the aim of producing a web-based search platform to support PSPC’s procurement officers in identifying environmentally-preferable goods that meet client department requirements.
Purchase of goods and services
In 2023 to 2024, PSPC will:
- support the Government of Canada's response to the COVID-19 pandemic through the procurement of critical goods and services
- advance the simplification of procurement practices through the implementation of procurement modernization initiatives
- continue to advance government-wide initiatives to increase the diversity of bidders in federal procurement, including through:
- the implementation of the Supplier Diversity Action Plan
- the launch of a new Supplier Diversity Program
- increase Indigenous participation by implementing new approaches through engagement and consultation with stakeholders, and by expanding guidance to support the implementation of new approaches to awarding contracts to Indigenous businesses
- advance efforts, as part of a whole-of-government approach, to eradicate forced labour from Canadian supply chains and ensure Canadian businesses operating abroad do not contribute to human rights abuses
- continue the development of new tools and guidance to support the adoption of green procurement across the federal government
- advance key procurements in support of Canada's defence policy, Strong, Secure, Engaged, and to improve continental defence capabilities, including the modernization of the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD)
- continue to collaborate with other government departments and industry to implement the National Shipbuilding Strategy
Payments and accounting
In 2023 to 2024, PSPC will:
- administer and deliver timely and accurate pay and benefits for all public servants, while making progress towards resolving outstanding pay issues at the Pay Centre and improving service standard compliance through approved projects and initiatives
- deliver timely, high quality, client-centric products and services to more than 979,000 active and retired members of pension plans administered by PSPC and apply evidence-based strategies to increase member satisfaction, while ensuring the ongoing integrity of pension data
Property and infrastructure
In 2023 to 2024, PSPC will:
- advance sustainability in government operations, climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies and greening government initiatives for PSPC real property and infrastructure assets
- advance the definition of work environment by supporting the Government of Canada's future of work, which includes operationalizing rapid modernization and transitioning to a hybrid work model
- continue implementing the Laboratories Canada Strategy which seeks to provide federal scientists with leading-edge, collaborative, accessible, and sustainable science and technology facilities
- advance the rehabilitation of the Parliamentary Precinct through the Long Term Vision and Plan
- further improve crossings in the NCR and advance the assessments and planning associated with a 6th crossing to ensure the health and safety of users
Government-wide support
In 2023 to 2024, PSPC will:
- adapt to the rapid pace of digital transformation in linguistic services, by experimenting with artificial intelligence and collaborating with other government departments and agencies to increase remote interpretation for official, Indigenous and foreign languages, and video remote interpretation for sign languages
- enhance and evolve government-wide services and solutions by providing cybersafe and digitally enabled environments such as the cloud, increasing information processing capacity and integrating modern tools that enable program services within the department and throughout the Government of Canada as per Canada’s Digital Ambition
- improve the Contract Security Program and the Controlled Goods Program to respond to an evolving external threat environment, and develop a more client-focused delivery approach to safeguard sensitive and strategic government information and assets accessed by the private sector
- strengthen the effectiveness of the Integrity Regime to further mitigate the risk posed by unethical suppliers, including exploring further measures to provide the Government of Canada with stronger tools to better respond to violations related to human rights, human trafficking, and forced labour
Procurement Ombudsman
While operating at arm’s length from federal organizations, including PSPC, the Office of the Procurement Ombudsman will:
- review the procurement practices of federal organizations to promote fairness, openness and transparency
- review complaints from Canadian suppliers and make recommendations for compensation where appropriate
- provide alternative dispute resolution services which offer an opportunity for suppliers and federal organizations to come together in a neutral setting with the purpose of:
- finding solutions
- preserving business relationships
- avoiding costly litigation
- share procurement-related information among federal organizations and Canadian suppliers to promote simplification and transparency in the federal procurement process
For more information on PSPC’s plans, see the “ Core responsibilities: Planned results and resources, and key risks ” section of this report.
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