Is it a story now?
We can now confirm that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Financial Crimes Unit (RCMP) has opened a criminal investigation into CSA conduct. FYI, the Financial Crimes Unit has responsibility for government corruption cases. We can further confirm that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) has initiated at least two criminal investigations into CSA activities in the United States.
Restore CSA;
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SDA gets results! “In December, the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) fired their President and CEO, Ash Sahi…”
In a series of discussions with CSA staff, both current and former employees, we’re gradually getting a clearer picture of the culture of the place and why it’s so poorly managed. Along the way, we’ve received internal payroll information and personnel files…
Another thing is clear – RestoreCSA has some serious sources.
The story goes like this. First, as we already know, the CSA is always looking for foreign companies to purchase with taxpayers’ money. One such acquisition target was a British company called SIRA. This target was a testing company, smallish and highly specialized…
Really, James Moore? $15,830 for a grep > out.txt or SQL SELECT? Really?
“Well Gord, where there’s smoke there’s fire.” So said one Parliamentary veteran about Moore’s cost inflation on this file. It seems that we’re onto something. Or, to rephrase, it seems that they’ve been up to something, that there’s evidence in the files, that Ms Pegeot’s up to her neck in it, and that’s why Moore’s not complying with his own Governments Access to Information laws.
But quoting James Moore’s own website; “it is only right that the activities of all those who represent Canadians in Parliament be as open and transparent as possible.” That is, unless its embarrassing to Moore or hobbles his ambitions or frustrates his minions.
Here’s what’s supposed to happen. A manufacturer makes a lovely widget. This widget, however lovely, requires [Canadian Standards Ass’n] certification to be legally sold or installed. The manufacturer must pay money to CSA, at whatever rate the CSA wishes, for CSA to not only test the widget, but also to inspect the facility in which the widget was fabricated. This latter part is called a field inspection.
So, two things to note; First, these manufacturers are a captive market for CSA, they are obligated to have CSA certification or they’re out of business, and; Second, the CSA makes the standards governing the widget and the inspection, so the CSA decides the service levels that they’re obligated to provide as well as the prices they’ll charge, while manufacturers have no choice in either matter.
Here’s what happens in practice….
On June 5th, 2009, two men walked onto the property of a private residence on Millar Ave. in Saskatoon. They had instructions to remove the safety labelling affixed to a residential building. This wasn’t a foreclosure, there were no banks involved, and it wasn’t sanctioned by local police. Rather, it was part of a much larger raid taking place on private properties all across the Province, it was a scheme to remove evidence. The two men were from the Canadian Standards Association (CSA).
So how did the [Canadian Standards Association] achieve identical test results, eighteen years apart, from a product so susceptible to external factors? Well, that was the CEO’s question….
“I’m calling about one of your Access to Information filings, there’s a problem with some of your requested data.” This civil servant had a gift for understatement. The problem? “This, …this ‘Ash Sahi’, we don’t know who this is.” Understatement indeed, that’s quite a problem.
You see, Ash Sahi is the CEO of the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) and, according to CSA, Sahi was formerly the Director of Industry and Trade at Industry Canada. How can records officials at the Federal Government not know who Ash Sahi is? How could he fit under their radar?
“I can find no record of anyone by that name, or individually by that first or last name, having been employed by the Federal Government.”
On January 5th, 2015, the CSA published a series of amendments to existing electrical law. The CSA decided not to subject these legislative amendments to public review. Or, more bluntly, the CSA decided to violate the law. And they’ve been violating these public review laws in each new legislative amendment to electrical law since 2006.
“So, what to do with Sahi.” That was the discussion.
Restore CSA: Moore’s Response Takes Fifty-One Weeks (and counting!)
The Canadian Standards Association…
…recently hired a new lawyer, joining the half dozen or so lawyers already engaged on RestoreCSA issues. But this new lawyer is unlike the others.
The CSA’s new counsel is Mr. Glen Jennings. He’s a criminal defence attorney.
Hewlett-Packard Recalls CSA Certified Products
We know that CSA has been selling influence over legislated standards and that manufacturers have been trading money for influence on CSA standards committees. We also know that CSA safety testing sometimes doesn’t involve any testing at all. We know that in practice, the CSA certification sticker means almost nothing.
What we don’t know is what went wrong with this certification.
RestoreCSA has a copy of a PowerPoint presentation given to CSA executives on the subject of potential fallout from false certification. Within this document, the CSA is fretting that they had to disclose “test results to confirm compliance.” Why were they worried? Because the test results didn’t exist. The presentation plainly acknowledges that consumer products are being certified despite “a lack of test data to support compliance.” Separately, we have a CSA executive’s handwritten notes from that meeting, and they’re impressive too. This executive indicates concern about “failing results” being noticed by government regulators. And they were under heavy scrutiny. As though the government was on to them, the notes refer to worries about “the need to report by tomorrow.” The notes also use the term “Gianluca.” What do you suppose that means?
In this crooked context, the victim was falling fast. The CSA kept threatening him with termination unless he started signing documents that he knew he shouldn’t sign. In one heart-rending discussion, we were told of the pressures he experienced at CSA. “He kept refusing, he just… I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m… I just need a moment.” And after a moment, the core of the problem: “he was raised honest, it’s just how he was.”
At the end of his days, “he was very worried about not having any money for bills.” He had no job. The CSA had “eliminated” him, apparently he wasn’t cooperative enough. Of CSA’s engineers, one insider confirms, they “run [the new engineers] through in about two-year intervals just to keep enough ‘paper’ on file to maintain the certifications. Then they get rid of them before they learn too much about how we operate to where they could be a threat.” The victim, it seems, caught on to CSA’s system too quickly. And worse, “he was talking about CSA too much afterward to others.”
Lets review. In 2010 the CSA was caught running an eight year-long counterfeiting operation in the sales of fake safety certifications of modular buildings. The CSA was caught falsifying test results, skipping entirely whole ranges of safety tests for consumer products, they have been selling blank product certifications to manufacturers, they’ve even had CSA secretarial staff authoring their engineering reports. This is the context in which the CSA is testing and certifying Canada’s operating room equipment. At the same facility. By the same staff.
“Good morning, my name is Oscar Jensen. I am 1 of 5 private investors of a consortium we call COPI (Consortium of Private Investors). […] We have come across the Dominion Airships website and we are very intrigued with the innovation.” So began a saga, a sideshow to the big show in CSA’s fight against PS Knight Co.
Its not just that CSA leadership is living large while the little people’s paycheques are getting smaller. Its how the leaders are getting their money.
A lot of “mostly long term mid level Canadian CSA staff are in the process of being whacked over last 2 weeks […] and not with the generous packages that were once the norm when Rob Griffin was in charge […] and I’m sure they have stories to tell you”. Indeed they do.
It turns out that getting more money means shifting CSA jobs to other countries. China now has a large CSA staff, of locals of course, not Canadians. And the CSA has a new facility in India. The Calcutta Standards Association? Then there’s the expansive CSA operation in Cleveland, and the CSA is moving even more jobs south later this year. Consumer product safety certifications for all of Canada are already handled out of Ohio. The Cleveland Standards Association? There sure are a lot of foreigners running Canada’s standards regulator.
Depends on who’s suing them: Is the Canadian Standards Association (CSA) a private not-for-profit corporation, or is it an agency of the Federal Government?
Minister of Industry, James Moore, claims that “the CSA is not government-mandated” and is “not a regulatory body,” that it “has no regulatory role in Canada,” and that the CSA “does not report to the Minister of Industry either directly or indirectly” and “does not report to the Standards Council of Canada.”
Likewise, the CSA claims that its a private, not-for-profit corporation founded in 1919.
So we did some digging.