Why the contract won by Boissonnault’s former company went undisclosed for months

The federal contract Elections Canada awarded to cabinet minister Randy Boissonnault’s former medical supply company was not posted publicly for seven months due to an “internal error,” the government agency told Global News.

Global Health Imports (GHI) won a $28,000 contract in January to supply Elections Canada with disposable gloves. At the time the contract was inked, Boissonnault, who is Canada’s employment minister, held a 50 per cent stake in the company.

Conflict of interest laws forbid ministers from having an interest in a private corporation that obtains federal contracts through which the company receives a benefit.

A cross-partisan group of parliamentarians have grilled the Edmonton Centre MP since June over a separate allegation he was involved in GHI’s business dealings while in office, in potential violation of ethics laws.

Both Boissonnault and his GHI co-founder, Stephen Anderson, testified before the parliamentary ethics committee about texts Anderson sent in 2022 citing repeated communications regarding a business deal with someone identified only as “Randy.”

Both deny Boissonnault is the “Randy” in the messages.

The Elections Canada contract, which has been active but unused, was not part of those discussions because it came to light recently. Elections Canada said the contract information was uploaded to the Open Government database on Aug. 9 — 217 days after the contract was awarded.

Boissonnault has said he had no knowledge of the contract since he resigned as a director of GHI after this re-election in the fall of 2021, in accordance with ethics rules, and has not been involved with the company since.

Tory ethics critic Michael Barrett called for the ethics commissioner to launch an investigation into