More ArriveCan-like debacles likely as government violates nearly all IT procurement best practices: study
The study cites the federal government’s overly long and costly contracts, a lack of variety in suppliers, and a ‘dearth of in-house competency’ as some of the problems
OTTAWA — The federal government’s IT procurement rules are so bad that they violate nearly every globally accepted best practice and will likely lead to more scandals like ArriveCan, according to a new research paper.
The study found overly long and costly contracts, a lack of variety in suppliers, the failure to prioritize open-source software options, the granting to companies intellectual property (IP) over products they develop for the government and a “dearth of in-house competency.”
“The federal government breaks almost all globally accepted best practice for modern public sector IT procurement, a reality which we argue helps explain why we have scandals like the ArriveCAN debacle that’s still unfolding,” Carleton associate professor and digital government expert Amanda Clarke wrote in the new paper.
“More importantly, we argue that unless we reform federal IT procurement so that it gets up to speed with widely accepted best practice in the field, any attempts to drive forward meaningful digital reform in the Government of Canada are bound to fail.”
