Public Safety committee  Mr. Chair, through you to the honourable member, you're quite correct that Ontario and Quebec will not be as affected by these proposals as the other contracting provinces will, because the RCMP doesn't assume the role of the provincial police forces—the OPP or the Sûreté du Québec.

Public Safety committee  Yes, the middle of January.

Public Safety committee  In my opinion, the policing at the Vancouver Olympics was a superb example of cooperation amongst various police forces. There were members of the RCMP, the Vancouver police, and police forces from across the country engaged in that event. To get back to the previous question on what I have been doing, we spent quite a bit of time being prepared for an onslaught of complaints as a result of the Olympics.

Public Safety committee  Torontonians may be more difficult than Vancouverites; I'm not certain. We've already begun to coordinate with the provincial force and with our provincial counterpart, and we expect to be fully up to speed well before the event occurs.

Public Safety committee  My preliminary assessment was to welcome that announcement. I believe it went a long way towards the recommendations of this commission. I think a further step that would be helpful would be to maintain a national register of complaints so that the public, the commission, and the RCMP would be able to ensure greater national standards as to how investigations are conducted, how these matters are resolved.

Public Safety committee  I'm thinking specifically of the RCMP.

Public Safety committee  Yes, that's correct. May I--

Public Safety committee  That's correct. Likewise, it's the first time I've come to this committee.

Public Safety committee  There are several questions there. First of all, in terms of the numbers of people we have to deal with the complaints, there are 40 full-time staff at the commission and approximately 20 short-term staff members. In addition, the commission retains outside investigators for specific projects.

Public Safety committee  Since I've been in this position the commissioner has not refused, on any occasion, to provide information. In fact the RCMP has been most cooperative. My concern in terms of the credibility of the process is that the public needs to be assured that the commission is given the tools and the information necessary to do its job.

Public Safety committee  That's a very interesting point. It gives rise to one of the general areas that I referenced, which is the ability to coordinate. For example, while we can share our decisions with the parties involved, we can't share them with the provincial ministers and with our provincial counterparts due to privacy legislation.

Public Safety committee  Correct.

Public Safety committee  I will try. I can say that it's fascinating work. First of all, with respect to the decisions, each one of them has been a very interesting slice of life. You see the decisions that have to be made by police officers on the job. I'm well aware that you don't want to be in the position of second guessing, but I can also see areas where police officers aren't given the right tools to do the job in terms of training and so forth.

Public Safety committee  We're going to do that probably quarterly. I've had the opportunity to meet with the minister, and I was given full encouragement to proceed as I thought best and to feel free to make recommendations as I saw fit. I met and had a very productive and enjoyable meeting with my predecessor to review some of the issues he had dealt with, and I gained insights there.

Public Safety committee  My understanding would be much more on the changer side.