Foreign Affairs committee  Here's what I can say. I'm not trying to avoid the question.

Foreign Affairs committee  We take transparency and openness very seriously, and that's one of the reasons we have a report that Ireland considered as the best model to go with and that pushes the limits of transparency and accountability. That's why we try every year to improve that report in terms of the

Foreign Affairs committee  As the honourable member knows, I'm not authorized to provide a suggestion on an amendment. I know this puts me in an uncomfortable position.

Foreign Affairs committee  Maybe I can try to do this at a level of principle that I hope gets us to the same place but doesn't cause me to get in trouble back at the office. In terms of the confidentiality requirement and the black box, the point would be that Canada signed up to this institution, and w

Foreign Affairs committee  There's an existing case of that in legislation, the Bretton Woods and Related Agreements Act, section 13 of which obliges the Department of Finance to present a report annually on the Bretton Woods institutions, and that's the report you have in front of you. As I indicated, we

Foreign Affairs committee  Yes. Paragraph 10(d) is actually almost word for word the same language as in section 13 of the Bretton Woods and Related Agreements Act. So we have two pieces of legislation mandating the Minister of Finance to provide two reports, the bulk of which would be absolutely identical

Foreign Affairs committee  At the level of a governor, which is the Minister of Finance who participates at the governors' meetings, all the decisions that are taken are public decisions, and we release summaries of those public decisions. Other countries can as well. The way the IMF and the World Bank op

Foreign Affairs committee  I guess there's a question here of how many times we want the same information to appear in how many reports. So we have an existing report that's comprehensive. Do we want an addition to that, a second report by the Department of Finance that's duplicative, and, in addition to t

Foreign Affairs committee  Indeed, we might consider making expenditures that are not designed to reduce poverty and we hope that the act does not inhibit our ability to make this sort of expenditure. If we want to calculate them differently, that’s another question, but as the bill is drafted at present,

Foreign Affairs committee  I want to be careful about not suggesting an amendment to the committee, because it's only through ministers or on the advice of ministers of the committee that amendments can come forward. I guess what I'm identifying is the challenge, which is that I didn't think it was the com

Foreign Affairs committee  Counsel advises me that we could be taken to court by an intervenor arguing that because we're spending on anti-money-laundering, because it's part of this broad definition of development assistance, and because it is not having as its primary goal poverty reduction, we are not a

Foreign Affairs committee  That’s a very good question. Without the authorization of a minister, I cannot present an amendment as such. However, I could raise the question, and this might help you find a solution. With regard to what we would like to include in the definition of what in English is called

Foreign Affairs committee  I'm a lawyer too, by training, and I assure you the questions I asked were not questions in the realm of speculation on a remotely theoretical case. I pushed hard with counsel to understand if this was a real risk. And I must say, based on a textual interpretation of the law as i

Foreign Affairs committee  I guess, sir, the concern is with the language you have, which is not a summary in general, but a summary of any representation made by a Canadian representative with respect to the policies and priorities of the World Bank. Those representations are confidential, as they are for

Foreign Affairs committee  As counsel advises me, the challenge is this. You have a definition of “development assistance” that's broad, and that's fine, but it would include things like anti-money-laundering. You then have in subclause 4(1) a prohibition on a minister providing funding under that broad de