Feds spent $440M on Microsoft licences, can’t say how many are used

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OTTAWA — The federal government spent over $440 million on Microsoft product licences, but some government agencies can’t say how many of those are actually being put to use.

Data contained within a response to an order paper question filed by Tory industry critic Adam Chambers shows the money was spent on software licences between March 2025 and March 2026 for a variety of products, including the Windows operating system, Microsoft 365, SQL Server, programmer tools such as GitHub and Visual Studio, Teams, and M365 Copilot.

SSC has no idea how many licences are used

Shared Services Canada (SSC), the federal agency responsible for government-wide IT services, accounted for the bulk of that spending — shelling out $407.8 million on bulk software purchases for itself and other federal departments and agencies.

The federal government paid $289.1 million to purchase 648,443 licences for Microsoft 365, and $21.3 million for 192,137 licences for Windows.

Seventy-one per cent of SSC’s spending went to Microsoft 365 — the all-inclusive corporate software package consisting of Microsoft Office, Teams, OneDrive and SharePoint.

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Individual departments spent tens of millions of dollars more purchasing their own Microsoft products, but SSC says it has no way of determining if any of the licences, including the ones it buys, are actually being put to use.

“Departments and agencies are responsible for assigning and managing their Microsoft licenses within their allocation,” SSC’s response read.

“Shared Services Canada does not have the ability to track or monitor license usage. As a result, Shared Services Canada is unable to provide a single, consolidated figure for the total number of users able to access Microsoft products across all licensing types.”

Other departments, such as Public Safety Canada, said they’re likewise unable to track unused licences, adding no metric exists to provide for that data.

Analysis of the response by the Toronto Sun revealed more than 70,000 unused licences across all reporting departments.

$69K spent on licences that weren’t used

Statistics Canada said it paid for 2,608 software licences that aren’t being used, including 210 of 446 SQL Server Enterprise licences from a $1.05-million purchase, and 897 of the agency’s 1,095 Visio licences.

Just under $69,000 was spent by Employment and Social Development Canada on 150 Teams Rooms licences for boardroom video equipment, none of which were used.

Some departments, however, reported their stockpile of unused licences was intentional.

Parks Canada said it keeps spare licences on hand for use by seasonal workers, and StatCan for hires related to the census.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation, which first flagged the figures on Friday, said taxpayers deserve better.

“Cancelling unused subscriptions is the most basic step any family takes to find savings and taxpayers demand the same from the government,” said Franco Terrazzano, the federation’s federal director.

“A former finance minister told Canadians she cancelled her Disney+ subscription to save money. Now it’s time for the current finance minister to tell bureaucrats to cancel the taxpayer-funded subscriptions they’re not using.”

bpassifiume@postmedia.com
X: @bryanpassifiume

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