COVID-19 vaccination requirement for supplier personnel

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As of November 15, 2021, all supplier personnel must be fully vaccinated to access federal government workplaces. Suppliers will be required to provide a certification to their contracting authority.

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Vaccination requirement for supplier personnel

As of November 15, 2021, supplier personnel who access federal workplaces must be fully vaccinated. Federal government workplaces include all places of work under the responsibility of the Government of Canada where federal government employees are present.

The vaccination requirement does not apply to:

  • contracts that are solely for the provision of goods
  • contracts where services are solely performed in non-federal government workplaces
  • situations where federal employees must enter contractor facilities (for example: to conduct compliance audits or security verifications)
  • contracted personnel who will only access common areas of buildings that are open to the public (such as the lobby)

Existing contracts and contractors

Contractor personnel who access Government of Canada workplaces to perform work pursuant to existing contracts are subject to the vaccine requirement.

Meeting the vaccination requirement

You are considered fully vaccinated if you have received:

  • the full series of an accepted COVID-19 vaccine or a combination of accepted vaccines including:
    • 2 doses of any combination of Moderna Spikevax, Pfizer-BioNTech Comirnaty or AstraZeneca Vaxzevria (including CoviShield)
    • 1 dose of Janssen (Johnson & Johnson)

For more information on accepted COVID-19 vaccines, you can consult the Vaccines for COVID-19 page.

Certification Process

Suppliers must submit a certification form by October 29, 2021, certifying that their personnel who access Government of Canada workplaces will be fully vaccinated as of November 15, 2021.

The Government of Canada will provide further information and instructions regarding the implementation of the vaccination requirement for contracted personnel shortly.

Existing contracts

Contractors who currently have a contract with the Government of Canada will be contacted by the contracting officer with a certification form that they must complete and return, certifying that their personnel that access federal workplaces will be fully vaccinated as of November 15, 2021. Contractors who do not submit the certification may be subject to further measures, up to and including termination.

Future contracts

As of October 15, 2021, bidders for contracts that will require supplier personnel to access federal government workplaces must submit a certification proving they meet the vaccine requirement as a condition of the bid. Bids that do not include the certification will not be considered. The certification form will be included with implicated Requests for Proposals.

Special circumstances and exemptions

Some contracted personnel may not be able to get fully vaccinated due to:

  • a certified medical contraindication
  • religious grounds
  • other prohibited grounds of discrimination as defined in applicable human rights legislation

In such cases, contractors are expected to inform the responsible contracting authority as soon as possible of:

  • the number of such personnel
  • the impacted work locations
  • the steps the contractor proposes to undertake to mitigate any associated risks (such as regular rapid testing)

Exemptions and any mitigation measures are subject to approval by the contracting and technical authorities.

Contractors should not share any personal information with the contracting authority, such as any specifics about:

  • medical contraindications
  • disability
  • religious grounds

Monitoring

Client organizations will be responsible for monitoring contractors’ adherence the vaccination requirement. Additional information will be communicated to implicated contractors by the client organization or contracting authority as required.

Failure to meet requirement

Suppliers who do not provide the required certifications or who are subsequently discovered to have provided an untrue certification, may be subject to measures up to and including contract termination.Date modified:2021-10-12

“Mutantism on the March” :Chapter 107 Mutant Killer Ants Terrorize Montreal

The fateful day dawned and the Jiber spent most of it guzzling Quebec apple cider and watching Johnny Jellybean repeats on CCF TV. After a dinner of grilled rabbit marinated in tarragon, mustard and yogurt with two bottles of cheap Spanish wine he wobbled out onto the street and hailed a taxi to take him to the headquarters of The Montreal Humane Society in NDG. He would show all these earthlings and stupid Zortixians just how brilliant he was. He picked the lock under the cover of darkness and found them smuggled out of North Korea by a defector….killer ants which were to be used by North Korean leader Conman Jugular Um to annihilate South Korea. The defector had been injured in an automobile “accident” as the reach of the North Koreans was long and the ants ended up at the Humane Society before they could be transported back to North Korea for their dastardly mission. It was a concerned physician caring for the North Korean defector that ensured the ants were taken to the Humane Society.

Jiber had had one of his agents steal a post graduate thesis from a chemical engineering student at Mc Swill University in Montreal involving the discovery of the B-17 formula that had the ability to enlarge certain insects to gargantuan size. If it works on the ants they would become Godzilla sized attackers. Hundreds of them and Jiber could subjugate the entire city of Montreal. Jiber spayed the ants with the B-17 and returned to his St. Leonard duplex to hear on the radio and television some 20,000 killer ants of gargantuan portion were attacking everything in their path including people, trees and pets. Jiber was convinced he would soon have a terrorized population under his control.

Dr. Zodiac comfortably ensconced in his luxury Ritz Marlton suite in Montreal had just finished his dinner of Greek sea bass and wild Greek herbs and was polishing off a bottle of Greek Moschofilero white wine when he thought he heard screams from Sherbrooke Street below his room. Most likely some guest had their television on a bit too loud. Zodiac was happy to be back on earth and in reality as opposed to some fantasy world of the Greek Gods in the Zlano dimension he was serving on many political committees and feeling he was making a valuable contribution to humanity in some manner instead of subsisting in some philosophical Neverland on Zlano. It was such a shame a deranged mayor called Droolpoop was spending so much money on the 1976 Olympics. Was he getting the money to construct facilities from Montreal mobsters so they could sell tainted horse meat at Olympic venues like they did at Expo 67 and skim some fat off city construction contracts? How the Olympic games had been perverted over the centuries. He remembered the first Olympics in Greece where he had presided as a judge. There was competitiveness and hostility but essentially they had been simple and dignified. Now they were huge showpieces creating superhumans through incessant training and doping while millions of humans wallowed in poverty and oppression. These disadvantaged needed help and quickly more than the tourism industry that could cater to the wealthy who could actually afford tickets to Olympic events. Zodiac spoke as an insider and not as a social worker who lived in the suburbs and travelled to the slums to help the disadvantaged. He worked free of charge in medical clinics of various Montreal neighbourhoods. Perhaps the screams were not emanating from a television set but from protestors demonstrating against the grandiose plans of Droolpoop.

Zodiac rushed to his window and looked below totally astonished to see a stream of huge ants invading Sherbrooke Street. He turned on his television and saw reporters in a state of near hysertia blurting out terrified accounts of hundreds being injured or killed by the mutant ants. Thousands of citizens lied moaning in the streets their blood full of the venom of these mutant ants. Zodiac racked his brains and remembered vaguely he had encountered something like this in his past but would it work here?

RKS Wine: Niagara Riesling: Shall We Get on The Merry Go Round Again?

I think it may be time for me to cease writing about Niagara Riesling. I have scuppered my chance of ever winning a Niagara Academy Award for astute and insightful reporting on Niagara Riesling. Much of it reminds me of a white Basque Txakoli which is so acidic it is poured into the glass a few feet above the glass to help dissipate some of its acidity. It suits just about all manner of seafood beautifully especially the halibut and the marisco soup served in a simple non pretentious restaurant in the Basque region of Spain called Hermandade de Pescadores (located in Hondarribia) perhaps one of the best seafood restaurants in Spain.

Now getting back to the issue of Ontario Riesling we try a Nomad Autumn Snow Riesling from Hinterbrook Estate Winery in Niagara-On-The-Lake which I passed by a couple of weeks ago while in Niagara-On-The-Lake.

It is just about platinum in colour.

On the nose I am picking up peach, mango, tangerine with some lime. The initial pour reminds me of white Vinho Verde from Northern Portugal a rather acidic white.

I brace my palate for a blast of acidity but none of that past experience with so many Niagara Rieslings rushes to my palate. I think I have been suffering from Post Traumatic Riesling Disorder from Niagara Rieslings. This wine has helped with my rehabilitation as it is not awash with brash acidity. No doubt there is acidity but it is laid back sufficiently from triggering my PTRD. There is peach, honey crisp apple with a little bit of sweetness but make no mistake this is an extra dry Riesling more Germanic than one from Niagara. It would suit Halibut in the most wonderful broth prepared by Hermandade de Pescadores!

Perhaps the wine has sharpened my perception of Niagara Rieslings as not being one-dimensional acid bombs convincing me there is a less acidic style quite like Vineland Estates Elevation Riesling. This is a style that I can live with and enjoy and hopefully you can too!

(Nomad Autumn Snow 2020 Riesling, Hinterbrook Estate Winery, Niagara-On-The-Lake, Ontario, $16.95, 750 mL, 12%, Robert K. Stephen A Little Birdie Told Me So Rating 89/100).

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” : The Paperwork

Here I was thinking that as a Marshall one zips around in a golf cart in the politest fashion asking laggards to get their asses moving to keep the pace moving. Well there is paperwork involved at my course and it is the following;

  • COVID SIGN-IN SHEET: You know the drill no fever or COVID symptoms, no travel outside of Canada etc. Additionally, by November 15, 2021, the day the course is to close, proof of double vaccination against COVID. You must sign an attestation before your shift.
  • GOLFERS AND THEIR TEE-OFF TIMES AND CART NUMBERS: This is updated each hour by the starter to enable you to know who is on the course and what time they teed off as well as their golf cart numbers.
  • HOURLY TIME SHEET: You are expected to track 9- and 18-hole times at the top of each hour. The goal is a maximum of 4:30 hours for 18 but depending on the day and time that can be as low as 3:15 and high as 4::45 on the weekends. Your time sheets are checked by the manager of the Pro-Shop. I have not been fired yet so I presume I am herding the sheep on schedule. You are given a sheet which indicates start off times and what time each golfer should be finished each hole. It is predicated on a full course and foursomes and may not be that accurate with poor weather conditions where start times are not 10 minutes apart but even then it is accurate enough to convince golfers they are too slow. This sheet is updated each hour by the starter.
  • INTERACTION REPORTS: Each interaction with golfers should be recoded even if is simply a hello and by the way you are on time. I think though management is more interested in reports that slow gofers have been advised to pick up their pace, pick up the ball and move to the next hole, asked to leave the course or have been advised to not consume their personal alcohol.
  • COURSE CONDITION REPORT: Each hour requires a report on the condition of the 18 holes. Is there a tree branch down, have recreational walkers and bikers been advised to leave the course, has a golfer been injured or have the greens or facilities been vandalized.
  • SIGN OUT SHEET: You record your hours worked in a binder which is signed by a Pro-Shop employee.

RKS Films: “Bad Ben Benign”

Aren’t you supposed to cringe in terror watching a horror movie? “Bad Ben Benign” is the ninth film in the Bad Ben Series. I come to it initially with installment 9 so I may be missing some deep contextual concept. But on the other hand as a newbie I may bring a fresh and unbiased perspective.

I don’t think you’ll be cringing in terror while watching this film. You’ll meet Tom Riley who is not terrorized by ghouls and demons but refreshingly treats them as annoyances. He would rather drink pickle juice and eat a newly opened bag of potato chips than chase around ghosts in his house. In fact he is a cantankerous and overweight human. It is this a reality horror show! I like Tom as a far less perfect character. His somewhat bumbling and fearless attitude makes him a horror anti-hero. In closer analysis the film verges on comedy with the audience waiting for some big horror moments which never come except for the last few moments of the film which put any of the out of place items throughout the house make sense. One wonders is Tom a new ghost in town?

The film will be released on October 26th on iTunes/Apple TV, Google Play Xbox, VUDU, DVD and through some local cable and satellite providers. This American film is work of director Nigel Bach who faced years of rejection from producers and finally decided to go out on his own and like Frank Sinatra did it his way! You don’t go and create 9 installments without having success. I am looking forward to #10 already. Nigel Bach renders an immaculate performance as a very likeable and human Tom Riley.

You can catch the trailer here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNU7L9t96-8

RKS Wine: The Penniless Pensioner Goes Overboard with His Tuscan Wild Boar Stew! Stanley Tucci a Special Guest for Dinner!

If you have been following Penniless Pensioner you’ll know he has gone from more or less rags to riches as his Bitcoin investment made him a wealthy man so he is no longer penniless but he insists upon drinking wine under $20 and stocking his wine cellar with wines carrying that price limit so he has a bit of “penniless” about him.

PP is going a bit nuts with his Wild Tuscan Boar Stew. You may recall he learnt how to make this dish at a progressive Roman prison from a well-known Italian chef while he was waiting for extradition to Canada for tax evasion. He is eating this dish and serving it to his friends loading them up with gout! He is also packing some pounds with all that pasta he is serving the stew over. Well I have been invited over for dinner for you know what! He bought an $18.95 Italian Aglianico Del Vulture which I assumed was from the Campanian region but it is from Basilicata.

So we start off with a Negroni and his delicacy comes served over his own home made pasta. We have a special guest Stanley Tucci a well-known actor and host of a popular CNN series “Searching for Italy”. Tucci has been travelling through Italy trying to find its soul in Italian food. He has come to Toronto as PP’s stew is talked about all over Rome. I mean he is such a big name the Italian state television network RAI has booked him on its top culinary show to teach the nation how he makes it. Tucci has brought a very high-end Super Tuscan wine but we will have that with a cheese plate after dinner.

We will have the $18.95 wine with dinner and save the $399.95 wine with our cheese. On the nose it’s a bit brambly and earthy which matches the heavy stew quite well. Black cherry rules the roost but there is a hint of chocolate and espresso. Not complicated but as aroma goes that permeate the room it suits the atmosphere nicely. On the palate its moderately heavy tannins cut into the fatty boar and the acidity of the rich tomato sauce made with San Marzano tomatoes of course. There are notes of blackberry, cassis and Cactus Pear. This wine cuts through and somehow compliments the essence of the dish. Tucci remarks with sincerity this simple wine compliments what is essentially a peasant dish far better than his smooth and elegant super Tuscan. Tucci calls the wine rustic and hearty and listens to PP wax about the low budget wine collection he is building. Actually while low budget PP says Wine Spectator gave this wine a 90 rating.

Tucci’s Super Tuscan goes well with the semi soft Italian cheeses PP has served. This Tucci is a charming fellow and looks forward to watching PP’s RAI show. Although plans are still in the basic stage Tucci and CNN are planning a series relating to Greek cuisine highly ignored in the gourmet world perhaps due to its “complex simplicity”. I mention to Tucci I make some awesome stuffed Greek vegetables and invite him and PP over next fall when local vegetables are in full swing. There is no way I am making Greek stuffed vegetables with winter Mexican produce! Tucci accepts! What a night despite my heated discussion with Tucci that his perfect Martini recipe doesn’t fly with me. Stirred Martini’s! I will bruise the hell out of my vodka by shaking it!

(Aglianico del Vulture DOC 2016, Casa Vinicola D’Angelo, Rioncro in Vulture, Italy, $18.95, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 97189, 750 mL, 13.5%, Robert K. Stephen A Little Birdie Told Me So Rating 91/100).

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” : Tales from the Edge : The Stalker!

A colleague in my pro shop told me when he was acting as a Marshall he met a woman who was a beginner and he helped her out by answering her questions about golf. Then he gets numerous calls for several days from this woman which he did not answer. A student working at the Pro-Shop gave her his number! So much for privacy! He never saw this woman again. Didn’t I tell you golf can be like life! Now what she was stalking is not certain!

RKS Wine: Two Sisters 2015 Merlot: Outrageous Gouging or Excellence?

A $84.80 Merlot from Niagara. Is somebody on a psychedelic trip or simply trying to hoodwink the public? Merlots from Niagara rarely impress so what makes Two Sisters confident an $84.80 price for a 2015 Merlot is justified. Putting this honestly this must be an awesome wine or a wine that is floating around in a fool’s paradise.

A great Merlot in my opinion should take you back to 1960’s Las Vegas with Sinatra, Dean Martin or Sammy Davis crooning in a smoke-filled room. Silky and sultry?

On the nose this portrays itself as a concentrated and rich wine. Full of decadent black cherry, blackberry and a smooth vanilla overlay. On the palate this will take you back in time to The Sands as you wait for Frank to hit the stage. It is rich. It is lush. It is a heavyweight. On the palate there is a richness that takes you aback somewhat. Really you must be joking? Is this Merlot from Rutherford in California? The fruit is so seamlessly integrated with the oak it is as if it has its own identity incapable of categorization. I can try my best and say cassis, black cherry but this may be a wine that goes beyond simple descriptive terms. The finish is short but decadently delish.

If I was blind testing this I would never ever say this is from Niagara. It makes a mockery of Ontario Merlots and is in a league of its own. I mean I can try and spread the word but for Joe Q Public and even for those who can afford $84.80 a bottle is this sellable? As only 250 cases were produced it is not focusing on mass distribution. I can picture the elite (former wealthy Torontonians) of Niagara-on-the-Lake being able to afford this but what a shame this effort is priced beyond the reach of us poor plebs. But as Christmas is coming dear relatives bring me a bottle for a Prime Rib New Year’s dinner and you and I will be saying where in the hell did this wine come from? Certainly not from Ontario!

Now it helped that the 2015 Vintage in Niagara was warm and dry and 2021 is both hot and extremely dry and should be a very good year for red wines.

(Two Sisters 2015 Merlot, VQA Niagara River, Two Sisters Vineyards, Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, $84.80 (available from the winery only), 750 mL, 14%, Robert K. Stephen A Little Birdie Told Me So Rating 94/100).

The winery website is https://www.twosistersvineyards.com/

After recovering from price shock this Merlot is exceptional and above my expectations for an Ontario Merlot. It raises a hope for Merlot in Ontario.

The winery is home to a lavish restaurant and a high-end tasting room second to none and I say that having visited wineries in Europe and California.

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” : Tales From the Edge : The Headless Groundskeeper (almost)

I heard this story from my favourite groundskeeper at my golf course who is a thirty-year veteran of groundskeeping including stints at some of the top golf courses in Ontario. We get along very well as I always am trying to learn and understand what he does and he senses my interest in him and his function. According to him the golfers at the snootiest clubs seem to be very entitled pricks who are not expected to replace divots or ball marks on greens. The denizens of industry and you can only imagine how they treat their “low life” employees. According to him the captains of industry are some of the most self entitled and arrogant pricks around.

So he tells me a few years ago at another golf course he was working at a tree branch had been broken and was hanging over a green. The supervisor told a groundskeeper to get a ladder and chainsaw and cut the branch down. Ladders and chainsaws don’t mix and that is a no brainer said my groundskeeper pal. Well the branch was cut off and came tumbling down hitting the bottom half of the ladder sending the poor man hurtling to the ground with the chainsaw still on. He lands on the ground with the chainsaw roaring away inches from his head! Although he was not decapitated the groundskeeper’s supervisor lifts the injured man into a cart further aggravating a serious injury which became the subject to litigation with the golf club losing a $250,000 judgement. Talking about losing your head over golf!

“My Life as a Golf Marshall” : Balancing your “work” and personal life

Depending on the amount of shifts you have as a Marshall your personal life schedule is somewhat diminished. I have retired as a lawyer but this is a new job indeed. Now it takes me 7 minutes to get to the golf course for an opening Saturday shift and 15 for a Sunday afternoon shift which is a fraction of time I spent commuting downtown when I worked there. A big plus!

Consider my typical Marshall shifts which are two a week and for me as the newbie I get the shit shifts being Saturday 7-12 and Sunday 12-4. Sunday is the absolute worst with the hackers and drinkers and dope smokers. The weekends are difficult as what energy do you have for socializing on a Saturday night if you are up at the crack of dawn and subject to horrific humidity or bone chilling cold. But it is the July and August shifts that suck the life out of you. You then may be greeted by a spouse who says cheerfully let’s take out the dog for a long walk. Saturday afternoon I fight nodding off and if I am expected to go out for a BBQ afterwards I am toast! Sunday is better as I can sleep in. Then my “free golf “on Friday and Monday at 8 a.m. so as not to take up the entire day as I am home for lunch or a long dog walk. Quite frankly I am in a state of perpetual exhaustion. But I smile and say sure let’s go on a live a normal life but my hours are not normal. I feel like a nighttime shift worker compounded by an elderly dog that barks to go out and pee at 5:15 a.m. What is the use of going back to sleep? My shit shifts screws up my week-end. And this gig is lasting 7 months! I suppose this is the price one must pay to be a Marshall?

Given that I am at the golf course 4 days a week trying to fit in a personal life is difficult and positively prohibitive as for vacation time which in these days of COVID is about nil. My career as a Marshall might be limited to a year and when COVID restrictions lift it may be time to retire!