Canada announces Defence Investment Agency to manage purchase, delivery of military equipment

The Liberal government has unveiled its long-awaited, long-promised agency to co-ordinate and speed up the purchase and delivery of equipment to the Canadian military.

The new Defence Investment Agency (DIA) was announced by Prime Minister Mark Carney’s office in a statement Thursday morning.

The new organization will be expected to consolidate procurement processes by removing duplicative approvals and red tape. It is also intended to provide the defence industry with greater clarity and certainty on the government’s plans.

With a centralized process of review, Carney said projects will proceed faster.

In a dangerous and divided world, Canada’s new government is ensuring the Canadian Armed Forces get the equipment they need, when they need it, the prime minister said in a written statement.

The new agency will bolster our defence industrial capacity, create new careers and ensure that in this new era, Canada’s leadership is not defined by the strength of our values, but also by the value of our strength.

Significantly, the new agency will have a mandate to work more closely with partners such as the United Kingdom, Australia and France, who already have dedicated procurement bodies, making joint defence purchases and partnerships easier and more efficient.

At the moment, Canada buys most of its military equipment from the United States.

During the last federal election, Carney promised to diversify where the country goes shopping for defence hardware and early last summer signed a joint defence partnership with the European Union — an agreement that opened the door for Canada’s participation in the $1.27-trillion ReArm Europe plan.

Also on Thursday, the prime minister announced the appointment of former Royal Bank of Canada deputy chairman Doug Guzman as the agency’s chief executive officer.

Carney said Guzman brings three decades of experience in investment, finance and leadership to the new entity.

The secretary of state in charge of defence procurement, Stephen Fuhr, said there will be results.

With this new agency, our government is taking a decisive step to equip our soldiers, sailors and aviators with the tools they need, while investing in the growth of a strong defence industrial base, Fuhr said in a written statement.

The agency has been a long time in coming.

The defence industry has generally been in favour of the idea for years.

During the 2019 federal election, the Liberals, under former prime minister Justin Trudeau, promised to create a defence procurement agency.

But the initiative went nowhere.

The notion was discussed as far back as 2013 when the Conservative government of former prime minister Stephen Harper reportedly considered creating a defence procurement agency but opted instead to deliver a strategy, which has guided decision-making until today.

Reforming defence procurement has been a topic of growing concern on Parliament Hill, most recently with the House of Commons defence committee, which delivered a critical, wide-ranging report in June 2024 calling for urgent reforms.

Canada’s auditor general also weighed in with criticism last year on how the government applies Industrial and Technological Benefits (ITBs) to defence procurements.

This article is republished from RCI.