B.C.’s Auditor General has flagged more than 50 direct contract awards by the BC Liquor Distribution Branch.

Carol Bellringer says her Office audited 74 direct contract awards by the LDB, and found 73 per cent were not awarded impartially. The audited contracts were awarded between April of 2016 and July of 2018.

“There was a preference given to one supplier without it being an open competition. I mean it’s preferential in that sense. I think different people have a different perspective on what that might mean. But we went as far as looking for their justification for it, but once they didn’t compete it, I mean that speaks for itself.”

“Preference and familiarity is all a risk associated with not competing something. In particular the contracts that get extended, we do hear often from organizations that choose not to compete those things, they’re comfortable with the supplier they already have. But that’s not compatible with the government’s policy of fair and open competition.”

Bellringer says one of the direct contracts audited was a last-minute award for an annual LDB staff appreciation worth $57,000, which it justified as an emergency despite being an annual event where a contract is awarded. Another was an eight-year contract worth $8.5 million for retail service software that was later amended to increase the contract’s value to $14.2 million; Bellringer says the LDB did not compete the contract and consult the market to see who else could meet its needs.

The Auditor General Office has now made a handful of recommendations to the LDB to make the process of contract procurement more fair in the future.

“The one thing that is really not part of the recommendations specifically, but it is pointed out that with that turnover in staff, the function has been moved within the organization frequently in the past. The need for stability is an important one.”

Of the 74 contracts, 67 totaled $24 million in Canadian dollars, and the seven others were worth $646,000 U.S.

NL News has reached out to the Liquor Distribution Branch for more information.