Good morning. Ottawa wants the best and the brightest to help build major projects, but its recruitment campaign has unsettled Bay Street and angered unions. More on that below, along with new security guarantees for Ukraine and Rob Reiner’s wide-ranging career. But first:

• The Bondi Beach shooting suspects visited an Islamist militant hot spot weeks before the attack, police say
• A Canadian military intelligence officer allegedly shared classified information with Ukraine
• Jimmy Lai’s Canadian family and MPs call for his release on humanitarian and health grounds

Despite its snoozy name, Ottawa’s new Major Projects Office has a lot going for it – which is good, given its ambitious mandate to fast-track a bunch of nation-building ventures that will reduce our economic reliance on the United States.

It has an experienced chief executive in Dawn Farrell, who oversaw TransAlta’s costly transition from coal to clean energy, then managed to complete the Trans Mountain pipeline. It has $214-million in funds over the next five years to help with the approvals and financing of these major projects. It has Mark Carney’s attention – the Prime Minister views the MPO as a signature initiative.

What it doesn’t have, however, is nearly enough staff.

Sure, finding high-ranking employees isn’t a problem. There’s no shortage of banking directors, board chairs, energy executives and corporate lawyers who’ve made a mint already in the private sector and are happy to take on a government salary.

But Globe and Mail financial reporter Tim Kiladze discovered that poaching junior and mid-career staff is a very different matter. Younger hires aren’t as keen to step off the corporate ladder and fall behind on their internal promotion tracks. Many are also juggling young kids and big-city mortgages, so it’s less tempting to make $150,000 in public office when they’ve been raking in $500,000 a year as investment banking VPs.

“I understand how insane that salary sounds, but Bay Street compensation has gone wild since the pandemic,” Kiladze told me. To save the global economy, we flooded the world with money, which swiftly found its way into financial assets. “Just look at the stock market. It’s soared. That leads to more dealmaking and trading, which generates more and more money for the finance world.”

To sweeten the deal, then, the MPO came up with a proposal: What if the private sector loaned its employees to the federal government? And also topped up their salaries while they were away on those stints? Or perhaps offered super-sized bonuses when workers returned to their old jobs?

Bay Street isn’t exactly wild about the idea. For starters, sources told Kiladze, the request has seemed more like a directive – putting companies in an awkward spot, as they don’t want to risk running afoul of Carney. Plus: the money. “Business leaders are frustrated,” Kiladze said, “because if they lose top talent to the MPO, they’re going to be short-staffed on their own side – and then they’re being asked to pay for people who’ve left?”

And as Conservative MPs have been quick to point out, the whole situation is an ethical quagmire. Banks could end up advising the MPO on the very deals their loaned-out employees are arranging. Energy and mining companies with temporary MPO workers may develop the projects being considered right now. Critics also insist the salary top-ups give corporate insiders a chance to buy Ottawa’s favour. Conservative MP John Brassard put it bluntly during Question Period last Thursday: “This is wrong, unethical and corrupt.”

So why not just hire from the public sector, you ask, since the government is cutting 40,000 civil servants as part of a $60-billion internal savings plan? The unions wondered that as well, but Natural Resources Minister Tim Hodgson explained that the MPO requires a singular type of talent. “We’re trying to bring in people who have built and know how to build,” he said. “We need to get the best and brightest for that particular role. That’s something that the government hasn’t done a lot of in the past.”

If you can believe it, Hodgon’s comment did not go over well. Sean O’Reilly, the president of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada, fired back that his union’s members could do the job – and they’ve already demonstrated that they work in the country’s best interests. Unlike outside consultants, who are loyal to shareholders, “we are loyal to Canada,” he said.

After finding fame on a TV sitcom, Rob Reiner proved to be an enormously versatile filmmaker, directing This is Spinal Tap, Stand By Me, The Princess Bride, When Harry Met Sally..., Misery and A Few Good Men in just eight years. Read The Globe’s appreciation and the latest on Nick Reiner’s arrest on suspicion of his parents’ murder.