Military purchasing hurdles ‘persistent’: audit

An internal federal government audit delivered late last year warned the work of buying and upgrading military technology was still being plagued by bureaucratic hurdles.

The report was released as the federal government forged ahead with reforms meant to speed up purchases of military equipment.

The review began in the waning days of former prime minister Justin Trudeau's government and was delivered in late 2025.

The audit said it found "persistent challenges" in the procurement system, even though it is “evolving rapidly” under Prime Minster Mark Carney's government.

“Despite significant progress, the evaluation identified persistent challenges, such as disconnected databases, heavy oversight and excessive project documentation requirements,” the audit said.

The audit warned that even uncomplicated purchases tended to take on average a decade to complete. More complex projects to add new capabilities took anywhere from one to three decades to close out, it said.

Asked for comment about the audit, Conservative defence critic James Bezan said it's "outrageous that our women and men in uniform need to wait between nine and 27 years to get the equipment they need to defend Canada."

The audit said it examined 84 projects it could easily track — which is not necessarily a representative sample due to the complexity of the government's paper trails.

A spokesperson for MP Stephen Fuhr, Carney's point person for reforming defence procurement, did not respond to a request for comment by deadline.

Carney’s government has been moving to accelerate defence purchases to meet steep annual spending commitments to the NATO alliance, and to advance large priority purchases down the field.

Defence Minister David McGuinty said at an event on Wednesday the government is moving major purchases along as fast as it can, and is slashing years off the process of buying a multi-billion dollar fleet of submarines for the Navy.

The government has settled on that submarine project as a showcase for how intends to speed some procurements along.

The Liberal government's structural reforms are also far from complete. It's expected to table legislation this spring to beef up the new defence investment agency, which is meant to streamline procurement decisions and speed up purchasing.

That office is currently embedded within an existing department but is expected to legally become a stand-alone, independent office.

Bezan dismissed it as an "unnecessary" layer of new bureaucracy that won't address core problems.

The audit cautioned that some policies — designed specifically for emergency acquisitions during crises — are “constrained by limited scope, heavy governance and lack of cross-departmental coherence.”

It warned that even projects flagged as urgent — or as an “unforecasted operational" requirements aimed at addressing “critical” short-term gaps in military capabilities — aren't guaranteed to move quickly and still have to "navigate the full bureaucratic maze."

Flagging purchases as urgent can sometimes slash procurement timelines from a decade or more down to three years or so. But the audit warned it does “not deliver on its mandate” and that some purchases have not “progressed as intended, which raises questions about the suitability of the current framework.”

The audit painted a picture of understaffed project offices overwhelmed by paperwork and the large number of stakeholders with which they have to consult.

“Success is relative and is not satisfactory according to program staff,” it said. “The system is not designed for speed."

The report said five projects it examined related to the mission in Latvia that were flagged as urgent were expected to take between 30 to 40 months to reach initial operating capability. It did not say what the projects are.

The audit examined two specific policies in detail. The first is "agile procurement" for IT projects and the second is called "continuous capability sustainment" — which was outlined in the last defence policy update and is meant to upgrade equipment as it goes through its regular maintenance cycles.

The military typically waits until a platform or technology is about halfway through its life expectancy before upgrading its systems. The audit said that if the two policies were better supported, they could make an “immediate impact” on improving procurement.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 16, 2026.

By Kyle Duggan | Copyright 2026, The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.