The federal government has signaled a massive new investment in Canada’s defence capacity — an overdue step toward securing the strength of the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF). This investment includes the rapid approval of major projects to modernize aging CAF infrastructure, like barracks and garages on Canadian Forces bases (CFBs), with increased spending to design, build, and maintain new facilities. Ahead of the fall budget, however, the government needs to ensure that this investment delivers real value and security for Canadians by ending its reliance on private contractors at the Department of National Defence (DND), and to reinvest instead in rebuilding the public service capacity.
Civilian defence workers are essential for the military readiness of the CAF. They maintain infrastructure, feed and support troops, provide emergency services, and ensure bases run safely and efficiently. Yet, these vital jobs have been steadily contracted out in recent years to private, for-profit firms. This has meant profiteering at the expense of Canada’s security, and a hollowed-out DND whose budget is spent on corporate contracts rather than personnel.
As a bottom line, the workers who deliver public services should be public servants.
Between 2018 and 2019, DND spent nearly $3.7 billion on contracted-out services making up one-third of all personnel spending. Despite big spending on multi-million-dollar facilities maintenance contracts, CAF bases have been left in state of disrepair that staff call “breakdown mode” where infrastructure is fixed only after it fails. A study of DND privatization found that the outsourcing of cleaning services at CFB Kingston increased costs by 35 percent for the same level of service.
The pattern is clear: private firms profit while Canadians pay the price. Multinational contractors like Serco, Aramark, and Dexterra continue to take on major DND contracts despite the ongoing security issues among some of these contractors around the world, from investigations into fraud, to safety failures, and human rights violations against contract staff. Meanwhile, military members and base communities contend with reduced service quality and deteriorating infrastructure when good public service jobs are replaced with low-wage, precarious work.
According to federal spending data and independent audits, in-house public service delivery offers more transparency, accountability, and long-term value than contracted work. A study by Québec think tank IRIS also demonstrates that each dollar spent on public sector employment adds up to $1.77 in economic benefits and nearly doubles the number of jobs in the wider economy. In contrast, contracting out public services drains public resources and erodes local economies that depend on federal employment without improving quality. When these jobs are privatized, accountability disappears along with employment equity, fair wages, and secure pensions.
Canada’s ballooning overall reliance on external consultants and contractors en lieu of the public service, now exceeding $26 billion spent annually, is unsustainable. It costs taxpayers more while weakening internal expertise and capacity across government. At DND, instead of funneling new defence spending into private contracts, we must bring this work back in-house to rebuild institutional knowledge and resilience.
Re-building in-house capacity is especially urgent for Defence Construction Canada (DCC), a crown corporation that manages much of DND’s infrastructure spending. Since its creation in 1951 to build Cold War infrastructure, DCC has expanded beyond its original mandate, taking on civilian projects, such as the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, that embed public service engineers with private sector project managers who take significant markups for each project. This expansion has entrenched contracting out, reduced transparency, and driven up costs without improving results. The federal government needs to re-examine DCC’s role, limit it to exceptional projects, and restore oversight to elected officials and accountable public servants.
Canadians expect transparency and value for money when it comes to national security, not corporate secrecy and profit-taking. The readiness of the CAF and the safety of Canadians depend on a well-resourced, accountable public service that can deliver critical work with integrity.
To invest in the future of Canada’s defence, the federal government must also invest in the personnel who sustain it. Ending the practice of contracting out at DND is in the interest of national security and public trust while respecting workers and taxpayers. As a bottom line, the workers who deliver public services should be public servants.
