Poilievre Says Ottawa’s Defence Industrial Strategy Too Heavy on Bureaucracy 

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre says the Liberal government’s new defence industrial strategy will create more government bureaucracy without adequately speeding up the procurement of military equipment.

Poilievre told reporters on Feb. 17 that Prime Minister Mark Carney’s newly announced strategy “adds six new bureaucracies—agencies, councils, units, and other bureaucracies that will actually gum up and slow the system down.”

Ottawa’s new defence industrial strategy allocates $6.6 billion in funding over five years to ramp up domestic capabilities for military supplies, and to partner or procure assets where there may not be an alternative domestically. It also includes priorities to partner with small and medium-sized businesses in Canada to procure equipment.

Carney told reporters earlier in the day that the strategy encourages the purchasing of equipment produced in Canada instead of relying on foreign military contractors.

“It means building a domestic defence, industrial base so we are never hostage to the decisions of others when it comes to our security,” he said.

The Liberal government said the implementation of the strategy is expected to generate 125,000 jobs over the next 10 years, and is anchored on “Buy Canadian” principles. The strategy also seeks to increase Canada’s defence exports by 50 percent, while increasing the total revenues of the Canadian defence industry by more than 240 percent.

The strategy includes the creation of a Drone Innovation Hub at the National Research Council, a new Bureau of Research, Engineering and Advanced Leadership in Innovation and Science (BOREALIS) to coordinate and accelerate defence research and innovation, a new Canadian Defence Industry Resilience Program to strengthen Canada’s sovereignty, and a new Science and Research Defence Advisory Council.

The strategy comes as Canada is seeking to increase its defence spending to meet its NATO commitments of 2 percent of GDP on defence within the 2025–2026 fiscal year, and 5 percent of GDP by 2035.

Poilievre said the Conservative Party is in agreement that “Canada needs to become militarily independent” and have the best technology and equipment to defend its sovereignty. He also said Canada should have its own defence supply chains and not be “overly reliant on the Americans and on other countries.”

However, Poilievre said too much bureaucracy has led to it taking seven to 10 years to approve the purchases of military equipment, which “goes out of date” within a few years.

“This is not sustainable in the modern warfare environment,” he said.

The Tory leader said the Ukrainian government has been procuring equipment at an “unimaginable” pace for its war with Russia, including by purchasing drones for $300 to $1,000 from Ukrainian civilians and putting them into operation within a few days.

“The days of having like 15- or 20-year procurement processes, they have to end,” Poilievre said. “That means eliminating all the bureaucracy and empowering our military personnel to make purchases directly of the new technology and equipment that they identify and need, with fewer steps.”

Poilievre also criticized the prime minister for hiring Doug Guzman, a former Goldman Sachs investment banker, to head the Defence Investment Agency, as he “doesn’t even have a military background.”

“We don’t need more high-priced CEOs and bureaucrats. We don’t need juicier contracts for multinational corporations. What we need is nimble, fast, agile, MacGyver-like purchases of the equipment,” he said.

Poilievre said he wanted Canada to procure equipment that would both “limit bloodshed and limit cost to taxpayers,” and his party plans to provide plans to the Liberal government on how to do that in the coming weeks and months.

Guzman told MPs during a parliamentary committee last week that it helps to bring in people from the outside to improve processes, saying that large corporations have experience with complex procurement systems.

“The assignment we’ve received is to have a look at the process that we’ve got today, and I think everyone is unanimous that it could be improved,” Guzman said on Feb. 10.  “A small number of folks from the outside who’ve got experience to come in and improve the process, I think would make good sense.”