Officials withheld cost information, minister told

The Public Works and Government Services Department deliberately withheld information from taxpayers that cast doubt on its explanation about replacing workstations at an Environment Canada building with new furniture, officials told their minister, Rona Ambrose, in a newly released memorandum. The department publicly claimed last summer that a controversial decision to replace workstations in a Gatineau, Que., building, under renovations, would be 20 per cent cheaper than recycling old workstations. But it privately told Ambrose its strategy was “evolving” and that it had received an unsolicited bid from an Ottawa office supplies company for recycled furniture that would be about $ 1,000 per workstation cheaper.