Geographic Advantage
Canada shares a land border with the United States, which creates both unique risks (proximity to US legal reach, interconnected infrastructure) and advantages (existing Canadian datacenter capacity built to serve North American markets, significant IT workforce). Canada also benefits from strong trade relationships with both the EU and UK, enabling cooperative sovereign cloud participation.
Canadian Governance Structure
| Role | Organisation | Responsibility |
|---|---|---|
| Political Authority | Prime Minister / Cabinet | Emergency authorisation, Cabinet Directive |
| Programme Lead | Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) OCIO | GC Enterprise Architecture, policy direction |
| Infrastructure Delivery | Shared Services Canada (SSC) | Datacenter operations, network, hosting |
| Security Authority | CCCS (Canadian Centre for Cyber Security) | Security standards, threat assessment |
| Procurement | Public Services and Procurement Canada (PSPC) | Emergency procurement, contracts |
| Defence Systems | Department of National Defence (DND) | Classified systems, defence workloads |
Canadian Estimated Budget (Federal Government)
Total Programme Cost: CAD $750M - $1.4B (initial) + $80-150M annual
Note: Federal government only. Provincial systems would be additional investment.
Provincial Coordination
Ontario
Ontario Digital Service coordination. Provincial datacenter capacity available. Toronto as financial services hub.
Quebec
Strong data sovereignty requirements (Law 25). Provincial infrastructure. Montreal as AI/tech hub.
British Columbia
Pacific gateway. Provincial BC Gov hosting. Vancouver tech ecosystem.
Alberta
Energy sector integration. Provincial computing resources. Calgary/Edmonton capacity.
Phase 1: Federal Emergency Declaration
Week 1-2- Cabinet Directive - PM authorises emergency sovereign cloud programme under national security provisions
- TBS policy directive - Immediate freeze on new US cloud deployments across GC
- SSC capacity assessment - Inventory of available datacenter capacity (Borden, Gatineau, regional)
- PSPC emergency procurement - National security basis procurement authority activated
- CCCS engagement - Security framework and fast-track certification established
- International coordination - Liaison with UK, EU, Australia cooperative governance
- Provincial notification - Federal-provincial coordination initiated
Phase 2: Infrastructure Deployment
Week 3-8- SSC Enterprise Datacenter expansion - Hardware deployment at Borden and Gatineau facilities
- CloudStack/Kubernetes deployment - Core platform operational on SSC infrastructure
- GC Network integration - Secure connectivity to existing GC network infrastructure
- Canadian telco partnership - Bell, Rogers, TELUS capacity agreements for DR/expansion
- Security infrastructure - IAM, secrets management, security monitoring deployed
- Quebec node - Separate node for Quebec data residency requirements
Phase 3: Platform Services & Critical Systems
Week 6-14- canada.ca portal - Federal government web presence migrated
- GC Notify - Government notification service (based on GOV.UK Notify)
- Phoenix replacement systems - Pay systems on sovereign infrastructure
- CRA tax systems - Canada Revenue Agency migration initiated
- Service Canada - Benefits and citizen services platforms
- Immigration (IRCC) - Visa and immigration systems
- Employment Insurance - EI systems migrated
Phase 4: Department-by-Department Migration
Week 12-22- Core departments - Finance, PCO, GAC migrated
- Health Canada / PHAC - Health systems migrated
- Transport Canada - Aviation, marine, rail systems
- Environment and Climate Change - Environmental data systems
- Crown corporations - Canada Post, CBC, etc. coordination
- National Defence - Unclassified DND systems (classified separate workstream)
Phase 5: US Cloud Exit
Week 20-24- Contract terminations - AWS, Azure, GCP contracts terminated
- Data deletion verification - Privacy Act compliance verification
- US border considerations - Ensure no data flows via US routing
- BAU transition - SSC assumes ongoing operations