From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

A firm with two people working at home received millions but did not contribute anything to the project, two Conservative Party MPs pointed out.

An investigation by a government watchdog revealed that three-quarters of the contractors who were paid to work on the federal government’s $54 million controversial COVID-era ArriveCAN travel app did not do anything in building the scandal-plagued app.

The disclosure that most of the contractors did not work on ArriveCAN came in a report titled Procurement Practice Review of ArriveCAN from the government’s procurement ombudsman Alexander Jeglic.

“In roughly 76% of applicable contracts, resources proposed in the winning bid did not perform any work on the contract,” the report concluded.

The once-mandatory ArriveCAN app created by the federal government cost taxpayers over $50 million, no less than $8.9 million of which was given to an obscure GC Strategies company that was operated by a two-man team out of an Ontario home.

The House of Commons Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates (OGGO) is investigating how various companies such as Dalian, Coaradix, and GC Strategies received millions in taxpayer dollars to develop the contentious quarantine-tracking ArriveCAN app.

In specific, Jeglic’s report singles out GC Strategies, saying the two-man company did not prove that its list of subcontractors was qualified to work on the app.

The procurement ombudsman’s report also found “numerous examples” in which GC Strategies “had simply copied and pasted” required work experience that was listed by the government for its contractors.

The report also noted how it was unusual that the government used criteria for the app’s tender that were “overly restrictive and favoured” GC Strategies, which won the contract bid despite the fact no other bids were submitted.

Conservative Party of Canada (CPC) MPs Kelly Block and Pierre Paul-Hus condemned findings from the procurement ombudsman’s report in a joint statement Monday.

“A damning watchdog report has revealed that federal officials in the Trudeau government rigged the ArriveCan contract so it would end up with the well-connected, two-person consulting firm, GC Strategies,” the joint statement reads.

Canadians were told ArriveCAN was supposed to have cost only $80,000, but the number quickly ballooned to $54 million.

Block and Paul-Hus pointed out in their joint statement that experts have estimated that ArriveCan “could’ve been built in a weekend for $200,000.”

“But instead, the Trudeau government decided to waste $54 million in taxpayer dollars on this unnecessary and broken app. Unfortunately for Canadians, these recent allegations of abuse are starting to make the extreme $54 million price tag make sense.”

As for the app itself, it was riddled with tech glitches along with privacy concerns from users.

ArriveCAN was introduced in April 2020 by the Trudeau government and made mandatory in November 2020. The app was used by the federal government to track the COVID jab status of those entering the country and enforce quarantines when deemed necessary.

When the app was mandated, all travelers entering Canada had to use it to submit their travel and contact information as well as any COVID vaccination details before crossing the border or boarding a flight.

App’s creation rife with ‘corruption’ from the start

Block and Paul-Hus’s statement noted that since the ArriveCAN scandal became known, “whistleblowers have been silenced and government officials have been suspended without pay for telling the truth at Committee.”

“Now, as the allegation of corruption grows more severe, the RCMP (Royal Canadian Mounted Police) has decided to investigate the contracts for potential criminality,” the two said.

CPC MP Stephanie Kusie noted to the committee on October 26, 2023, that it should be “evident to everyone in this room as well as Canadians,” that there is “systemic corruption within this government,” when speaking about ArriveCAN. She added that government corruption “should be absolutely evident.”

Last year, LifeSiteNews reported on two tech entrepreneurs testifying before the committee that during the development of the ArriveCAN travel app they saw firsthand how federal managers engaged in “extortion,” “corruption,” and “ghost contracting,” all at the expense of taxpayers.

Canadian Auditor General Karen Hogan announced an investigation of the ArriveCAN app in November 2022 after the House of Commons voted 173-149 for a full audit of the controversial app.

Last year, LifeSiteNews reported that during a parliamentary investigation into the misuse of funds used to create the ArriveCAN travel app, Canada’s chief federal technology officer was threatened with contempt of Parliament charges for refusing to give clear answers to questions from MPs regarding his involvement with the much-maligned app.

In October 2021, Trudeau announced unprecedented COVID-19 jab mandates for all federal workers and those in the transportation sector and said the unjabbed will no longer be able to travel by air, boat, or train, both domestically and internationally.

This policy resulted in thousands losing their jobs or being placed on leave for non-compliance.

Trudeau “suspended” the COVID travel vaccine mandates on June 20, 2022. Last October, the Canadian federal government ended all remaining COVID mandates regarding travel, including masking on planes and trains, COVID testing, and allowing vaccine-free Canadians to no longer be subject to mandatory quarantine.

Over 700 vaccine-free Canadians negatively affected by federal COVID jab dictates have banded together to file a multimillion-dollar class-action lawsuit against the federal government.