CAF Procurement

[Kirkhill]

a culture “of painfully slow decision-making, extreme risk aversion [...] and an implicit acceptance that all defence spending is ultimately discretionary.”

One of the things that is a source of frustration for the [Canadian Armed Forces], for DND, for the Government of Canada and certainly for the minister of defence, is that our procurement processes have many, many layers, which does not always enable us to achieve the result as rapidly as we need to achieve the result.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2025/01/31/is_upgrading_the_canadian_army_a_mission_impossible_1088453.html

Andrew Latham, Ph.D., a tenured professor at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He is also a Senior Washington Fellow with the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy in Ottawa and a non-resident fellow with DefensePriorities, a think tank in Washington, DC.

 

[Halifax Tar]

Even at the minor level like what we do in day to day contracting on ships, the process is ridiculously slow.

And as much as it's the system it's also the PS buyers we have that seem to spend more time pushing back on buys than it would take to just buy the fucking items.

There is an attitude at the lower levels that needs to change.

We avoid, at all costs, going to our second line support, because it's not support anymore. It's slow and difficult.

 

[MJP]

Even at the minor level like what we day to day contract on ships, the process is ridiculously slow.

And as much as it's the system it's also the PS buyers we have that seem to spend more time pushing back on buys than it would take to just buy the fucking items.

There is an attitude at the lower levels that needs to change.

I haven't pulled a RCN purchasing groups in a long while but the CA absolutely does not get any bang for its buck with their local purchasing groups.

One of the largest issues with the way we do business at the base/unit level is there is no real coherent oversight looking at streamlining the process and if you let it the system/policy will drag everyone down. We are great at looking at purchasing files to find a mistake but no one is going in and saying "Hey, how can we fix this" unless someone keen comes along and makes it work. Even then it only gets fixed locally and usually only until they leave.

I am aware of one initiative in a CA base that has cleaned up many of the roadblocks that are within their control and the numbers have dramatically increased so it can be done. The problem is each L1-L4 approaches it differently and there is no one working to fix it in an overarching way.

This is a bit of a swerve as local purchasing has pretty low limits compared to large scale defence spending but it does highlight that it is a pervasive issue

 

[Rifleman62]

Belligerently, Canada waddles on.

In case readers are unaware, military procurement in Canada has all the alacrity of an upturned goldfish.

Love those statements.

 

[Alberta Bound]

To be fair, procurement across the whole GOC is horrible. After years of trying PW has been unable to find a manufacturer anywhere on the planet that can supply a new pistol to the RCMP. Apparently PWs standards can’t be met by any of the companies who supply every other police service and military.

 

[childs56]

A few of you have stated the issues. It is the entire system of procurement has failed.
From what I have seen it simply is set up to line the pockets of many people along the way. Not to provide quick cost effective procurement of products to the end user.

It is sad,because they are not providing cost effective timely services to the end user.
This needs to change and change quickly. But it will mean many out east will be out of high paying low productivity jobs.

 

[Halifax Tar]

A few of you have stated the issues. It is the entire system of procurement has failed.
From what I have seen it simply is set up to line the pockets of many people along the way. Not to provide quick cost effective procurement of products to the end user.

It is sad,because they are not providing cost effective timely services to the end user.
This needs to change and change quickly. But it will mean many out east will be out of high paying low productivity jobs.

To buy paper towel for the ship, I need a 2227 with 3 quotes, an SRCL (Security Requirements Check List) and an Accessibility Attestation. If I want to skip the 3 quotes I need a sole source justification form.

To buy fucking paper towel I need 3 maybe 4, separate forms. 3 of them make absolutely no sense.

And then it takes BLog 6 months to get us the paper towel.

I have met thine enemy and its name is bureaucracy.

 

[MJP]

To buy paper towel for the ship, I need a 2227 with 3 quotes, an SRCL (Security Requirements Check List) and an Accessibility Attestation.

To buy fucking paper towel I need three separate forms. 2 of them make absolutely no sense.

I have met thine enemy and its name is bureaucracy.

Why would you need 3 quotes for something less than $1k? Why a 2227 as the Ships Log folks, why not a Preq to the Purchasing Group that will do the buying for you? It isn't in your example but you also probably needed Sec 32, so you likely had to get the 2227 signed by someone with a proper DOA. Signing each form instead of signing one blanket Sec 32 for up X dollars using XY fin code over a certain time period is way more efficient than signing each 2227 (or getting sec 32 via email etc)

I am not really asking for answers, just pointing out that these are the bad policy/process issues that creep into simple things that make them unwieldy. Someone can fix these issues, the problem is getting someone to care enough at the right place/level to make buying smoother for units.

It is similar to the asinine HPR form that DMPP has decreed everyone should use for HPRs. They turn a largely automatic process into a manual one by having units get a form signed and attached in DRMIS. That work inordinately falls upon the already overburdened CSS folks in a unit not the people asking for stuff. They want this form to justify HPRs which is noble but there are better ways than making the coal face do more work. Intent is ok, but in execution they slow things down. It also ignores that many HPRs are driven by automatic process, so we are wedging in another manual stop.

One of DMPP's folks loves to say "let the system handle the ordinary and people the extraordinary" or in other words lets the system do things automatically for most things and only interven when absolutely neccessary. That same person because of their backgorund apes an HPR policy on the entire CAF that may have worked for their environment but defintely not for the rest of the CAF.

I could cry but my expedited tear catcher wasn't released by the Supply Manager yet.

 

[FJAG]

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2025/01/31/is_upgrading_the_canadian_army_a_mission_impossible_1088453.html
Andrew Latham, Ph.D., a tenured professor at Macalester College in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He is also a Senior Washington Fellow with the Institute for Peace and Diplomacy in Ottawa and a non-resident fellow with DefensePriorities, a think tank in Washington, DC.

The Indirect Fire Modernization project he discusses makes an interesting point but fails to mention the fact that the project has been going on for over two decades, when, by 2004, it was two projects called the Future Indirect Fire Capability project (FIFC) and the Mobile Artillery Vehicle System project (MAVS). The former covered wheeled and tracked SPs, and mortars and HIMARS. The latter was aimed at replacing reserve force systems with a vehicle borne light howitzer. The expected in-service date for these unfunded projects was 2015. Effectively the army divested M109s with no hope of replacement for a full decade (Against the army's wishes, ADM(Mat), a former gunner, kept a regiment's worth in preservation)

Then came Afghanistan and the M777 UOR and FIFC was waylaid. The MAVS died a sudden death on the VCDS's death when the army had failed to deliver to him their plan him as to how the direct fire systems would work (which he tied indirectly to the indirect fire that MAVS was to solve).

The M777 UOR and FIFC subsequently begat the Light Weight Towed Howitzer project (LWTH) which brought the total M777 inventory to 37 - inadequate to even equip the three RegF regiments fully by its in-service date of 2011. The LWTH [project was part of the army's Family of Land Combat Systems group of projects which also included the unfunded Long Range Precision Rocket project (LRPR) which has ever since been perpetually kicked down the road from horizon to horizon.

What is of interest is that the basic components of these projects has not changed over the decades. Certainly there has been a change in viable systems to fill the bill at any given time, but that isn't the issue. The issue is funding priorities varying from regime to regime (both military and civilian)

And don't get me started on air defence.

Let's be honest. Canada has been deprioritizing any capability that it thinks it can off load on a member of a coalition (to call a spade a spade - the US). We've been funding, more or less, the tools of a battle group and the ability to force generate battle groups and a supervising headquarters. Canada has been very conservative when it comes to funding any brigade enablers - and that's at some surprisingly low levels such as infantry mortars and ATGMs and even tanks, much less artillery and air defence or logistics.

 

[Halifax Tar]

Why would you need 3 quotes for something less than $1k? Why a 2227 as the Ships Log folks, why not a Preq to the Purchasing Group that will do the buying for you? It isn't in your example but you also probably needed Sec 32, so you likely had to get the 2227 signed by someone with a proper DOA. Signing each form instead of signing one blanket Sec 32 for up X dollars using XY fin code over a certain time period is way more efficient than signing each 2227 (or getting sec 32 via email etc)

In my example we needed three quotes for dollar value and all signatures were gained.

I am not really asking for answers, just pointing out that these are the bad policy/process issues that creep into simple things that make them unwieldy. Someone can fix these issues, the problem is getting someone to care enough at the right place/level to make buying smoother for units.

Talk to BLog all this is emailed to their Cust SVC group email in PDF attachment form. This is their 'policy'.

It is similar to the asinine HPR form that DMPP has decreed everyone should use for HPRs. They turn a largely automatic process into a manual one by having units get a form signed and attached in DRMIS. That work inordinately falls upon the already overburdened CSS folks in a unit not the people asking for stuff. They want this form to justify HPRs which is noble but theer are better ways than making teh coal face do more work. Intent is ok, but in execution they slow things down. It also ignores that many HPRs are driven by automatic process, so we are wedging in another manual stop.

We haven't embraced that at least. We use the HPR App that DNav Log developed.

One of DMPP's folks loves to say "let the system handle the ordinary and people the extraordinary" or in other words lets the system do things automatically for most things and only interven when absolutely neccessary. That same person because of their backgorund apes an HPR policy on the entire CAF that may have worked for their environment but defintely not for the rest of the CAF.

I could cry but my expedited tear catcher wasn't released by the Supply Manager yet.

You got a SM to reply to your email ? You found a virgin to sacrifice ?

My point is we need a process for mundane things like paper towel that don't require multiple levels of paperwork. For me a 2227 with EIA and Sect 32 would be sufficient.

To me the item is more important than the value.

 

[McG]

From what I have seen it simply is set up to line the pockets of many people along the way.

I would not assume malice where this is so obviously incompetence.

 

[MJP]

In my example we needed three quotes for dollar value and all signatures were gained.



Talk to BLog all this is emailed to their Cust SVC group email in PDF attachment form. This is their 'policy'.



We haven't embraced that at least. We use the HPR App that DNav Log developed.



You got a SM to reply to your email ? You found a virgin to sacrifice ?

My point is we need a process to mundane things like paper towel that don't require multiple levels of paperwork. For me a 2227 with EIA and Sect 32 would be sufficient.

To me the item is more important than the value.

Yea again not asking you to justify why, just pointing out the processes are bad. While I care, if folks want to keep doing bad processes, not gonna get involved but I have seen great things happen when sane heads make processes make sense.

Ack on the HPR app vs form, maybe they make it easier for the ships (which is good) but someone in the RCN Log world still fills out the form and attaches it to the PREQ/STO (bad)

 

[Halifax Tar]

Yea again not asking you to justify why, just pointing out the processes are bad. While I care, if folks want to keep doing bad processes, not gonna get involved but I have seen great things happen when sane heads make processes make sense.

You found sane heads ? lol

Ack on the HPR app vs form, maybe they make it easier for the ships (which is good) but someone in the RCN Log world still fills out the form and attaches it to the PREQ/STO (bad)

Perhaps, I've just never seen it used.

 

[Halifax Tar]

I would not assume malice where this is so obviously incompetence.

I would agree with you. And I dont belive its not well intentioned either.

But you know the saying, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions".

 

[MJP]

You found sane heads ? lol

Yea, working with one team right now where they largely solved an LPO logjam for a major base with some smart process mapping, tweaks in the process and better use of DRMIS. Still a work in process but it is promising as they get stuff to folks faster and while they buy more, the actual workload decreases because ancillary stuff that use to be in the process has been removed

 

[Halifax Tar]

Yea, working with one team right now where they largely solved an LPO logjam for a major base with some smart process mapping, tweaks in the process and better use of DRMIS. Still a work in process but it is promising as they get stuff to folks faster and while they buy more, the actual workload decreases because ancillary stuff that use to be in the process has been removed

Needing an SRCL and Accessibility Attestation to buy mundane things like paper towel, is burdensome. Even getting rid of the SCRL for goods LPOs and the Accessibility Attestation for ships would be a big help.

I know this is minor in comparison to the major projects that we like to talk about, but if we cant get the small stuff its no wonder the big stuff is all FUBAR as well. This is also that stuff that really frustrates the front end. Its the simple stuff.

 

[McG]

Canadian Army divisions get vote 5. I assume Atlantic and Pacific fleets do as well. How well does those procurements go?

 

[Halifax Tar]

Canadian Army divisions get vote 5. I assume Atlantic and Pacific fleets do as well. How well does those procurements go?

What do you mean, how do they go ? Do you mean the administrative process of conducting a buy ?

 

[McG]

I was more wondering if people are seeing success in that area. Are L2s doing good things with their vote 5 money?

 

[daftandbarmy]

Yea, working with one team right now where they largely solved an LPO logjam for a major base with some smart process mapping, tweaks in the process and better use of DRMIS. Still a work in process but it is promising as they get stuff to folks faster and while they buy more, the actual workload decreases because ancillary stuff that use to be in the process has been removed