Thanks, Mr. Chair.
Welcome to our guests.
Mr. Fadden, I was so shocked to read the comments that you made in the piece from 2022, in which you talked about procurement and you talked about abandoning or pausing the rules. I've been an elected representative for almost 30 years now, and if I were to go back to my community and talk about waiving procurement rules....
You mentioned the word “media” in your opening statement. I just can't imagine how that resonates with media. I get internally why that needs to happen here and I think it should happen, but how do we deal with the cultural issue in terms of the public's desire for transparency when it comes to government purchases? You can imagine, having worked here for quite some time, what the opposition would maybe do in playing with a waiving of the rules, so to speak.
How do we deal with the public and how do we deal with, by extension, the media when that's not the norm at any level of government here in Canada?