Members of 41 Canadian Brigade Group patrol on skis as the Canadian Armed Forces deploy in Yellowknife, NWT, on Feb. 16. Ottawa is procuring 65,000 new assault rifles for the Canadian Armed Forces.Carlos Osorio/Reuters
Ottawa is buying more than 65,000 new assault rifles from Kitchener, Ont.-based Colt Canada through an expedited procurement process that’s setting the standard for the government’s new Defence Investment Agency.
The contract with Colt, which will begin with the purchase of 30,000 rifles over three years for around $307-million, will replace the more than three-decades-old weapons currently being used by the Canadian Armed Forces. The purchase price includes ancillary costs such as new manufacturing equipment, two years of support with spares, and operator and maintenance training.
It’s part of the first wave of high-priority procurements being delegated to the investment agency, which was created last October to streamline an otherwise sluggish process. Secretary of State for Defence Procurement Stephen Fuhr, who oversees the agency, said delivery of the rifles will begin two years earlier than originally anticipated.
“The longer these processes drag on, time is money – that’s never changed and that won’t change. We’re very motivated to move quickly," Mr. Fuhr said in an interview. “Everyone’s suffering under a legacy system that just was not producing things that we needed in a timely fashion.”
New defence industrial strategy will jump-start investment, sector leaders and analysts say
Colt will manufacture up to 65,402 new assault rifles for the Canadian Armed Forces. The first 30,000 will be delivered beginning in 2027 and are general-service rifles, meaning they’re for broad use across the Forces and often serve as personnel protection or deterrence. The agency will procure another 19,207 general-service rifles and 16,195 full-spectrum rifles – for use in front-line combat roles – starting in 2030, though the contract details for this latter half of the order are still being ironed out, Mr. Fuhr said.
Ottawa says its spending on rifles will contribute roughly $10-million annually to Canada’s gross domestic product over the next five years and create 70 new jobs at Colt. This spending will feed into Prime Minister Mark Carney’s goal of allocating 5 per cent of Canada’s GDP to defence by 2035.
Stephen Fuhr, shown speaking at the Ottawa Conference on Security and Defence on March 5, says the Colt Canada contract is a good example of how the Defence Investment Agency intends to manage procurements.Spencer Colby/The Canadian Press
On Colt’s part, the 50-year-old company has committed to ensuring its rifles are made up of at least 80-per-cent Canadian materials and generate knock-on economic effects through the country’s Industrial and Technological Benefits policy. It’s unclear how much Canadian material Colt’s rifles currently contain. Those same content requirements are likely to translate into other procurements underway at Colt, Mr. Fuhr said, such as the 50,000 rifles it’s delivering to Denmark.
Ottawa has said the ammunition used in the Forces’ new rifles will also be made in Canada.
Colt Canada was founded in 1976 under the name Diemaco Inc. Today, it’s a part of the Prague-based Colt CZ Group SE, which has facilities in the Czech Republic, the U.S., Canada, Sweden, Switzerland and Hungary. “We are a piece of a global company who is a leader in small-arms ammunition serving allied forces around the world,” Sean Congdon, president and chief executive of Colt Canada, said during a Thursday press conference.
Mr. Fuhr said the Defence Investment Agency’s decision to proceed with a direct acquisition for the rifles was deliberate. The federal government has a long history with Colt, owing to the company’s involvement in the Munitions Supply Program, which was created in the 1970s and protects producers from competition.
Opinion: Great defence industrial policy, Carney. But how do we know it’s working?
For this reason, among others, the agency was able to designate this procurement as lower-risk, allowing it to proceed with a direct acquisition and reducing the number of Treasury Board approvals required. This risk-based approach was first introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic to speed up the procurement of personal protective equipment and vaccines, Mr. Fuhr said.
Typically, major procurements must be reviewed by the Treasury Board every time a milestone is completed to receive more money and continue moving forward. “It was an authority gate to make sure that projects didn’t come off the rails. That was the way we did things when defence procurement was decentralized and run across many departments that didn’t have the oversight it has now,” Mr. Fuhr said.
The procurement process is now changing through the investment agency, and the Colt Canada contract is a good example of the model it’s trying to achieve, he added. “We need to get combat capability to our troops. They deserve it. They need it.”
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Ottawa is procuring 16,165 full spectrum rifles from Colt Canada starting in 2030. The correct number is 16,195.