Mr. Speaker, the hon. member will remember that about a year or so ago in the House I said that when the commission was set up all relevant documents would be made available to the commission. The department has tried to meet the expectations that were made of it to provide those documents.
It is quite apparent that there have been some problems with the documents that appear to be missing. The department has given certain explanations. In fact, the chief of defence staff initiated a
search last week which turned up further documents that are now being analysed by the commission.
When the hon. member implies that we did not take the search for documents seriously, that is not true. Even as late as last week, to assist the commission this week in its exercise to look at the documents, it was the department that asked the RCMP computer experts to come in and assist it with respect to those deficiencies relating to the computers.