Pinetree Line Miscellaneous

1961 – Reasons for Delay – National Archives of Canada

CONFIDENTIAL

MEMORANDUM

28 Jul 61

AMTS

Apparent Reasons for Delay
Departmental Actions: Five Radars

  1. In general, it would appear that the working staffs of the agencies were following directions issued at Ministerial level. In most instances, there has been no written instruction, but routine follow-up with staff officials concerned indicated that such was the case.
  2. During the first 4 ½ month time lapse, it is believed that the former Minister was seeking confirmation from Washington that this part or possible a greater part of the programme was firm and not subject to change.
  3. The second time lapse of 1 ¾ months occurred with DCL ad was the result of a procedure which required approval of the Minister’s (DDP) office on all consultant appointments.
  4. The third delay was again with the Minister’s staff and resulted in CCE memo of 28 Jan to AMTS as follows:

"Under even file of 8 Jan 60, we informed you regarding administrative actions which had delayed the processing of the five Western Radars from the time of the Cabinet approval of the cost sharing proposal, 9 Dec 58, up to our TB submission 28 Dec 58.

May we draw to your attention a further delay of five weeks in that the submission is still with the DM prior to TB deliberation, which will, of course, consume additional time.

The CAS may appreciate this further information as it illustrates very effectively the disportionate relationship of administrative delays against engineering development time."
  1. The fourth delay of 4 months was again with the Minister’s staff withholding approval on his instruction. This was embarrassing to CCE because the consultants had advanced into working drawings on our insistence without proper authority. Interim authority was finally obtained in early May and full authority for working drawings followed on 16 June. The interim authority to pay for only work performed before the consultants were actually stopped resulted in our memo from AMTS to DM dated 9 May 60, a copy of which is attached.
  2. During the fifth time lapse, the projects were with DCL for tender call which should not require more than two months between receipt and award. DCL staff apparently had to await the Minister’s (DDP) approval before calling tenders.
  3. On at least three of these occasions we have started or re-started our consultants on a most urgent basis only to have the projects bog down in administration. It is surprising that they responded as well as they did, though with Penhold and Alsask, the pace did slow down. With no action being taken to call tenders for Gypsumville, Yorkton and Dana, it did not seem wise to place Penhold and Alsask on a crash basis and increase the risk of engineering errors.

Signed by:

(JW Griffith)
DCEP
2-5777