Finance committee  With respect to the fact that they were the same directors, again it speaks to what the corporate service providers offer. They set up these corporations. They prepare documents and articles that they provide to shareholders. They also arrange for manager shareholders and directors, so I'm not surprised that they would be the same directors.

Finance committee  Mr. Julian, can I—

Finance committee  Again, I can't speak to Parrhesia. The corporate service provider that we worked with was Cordery. Again, Mr. Julian, can I make a clarification on something?

Finance committee  Thank you. I just want to clarify that we stopped offering the product in 2003. The last time we offered it was in 2003. We did not manage the structure after that time, so I don't have information as to when any of these companies were dissolved. I just want to make that point of clarification.

Finance committee  I don't have any information on that entity.

Finance committee  I'm sorry; I'm not sure that I fully understood. Was it with respect to the offshore structure? I'm not sure that the translation is coming through clearly.

Finance committee  I think we've always been forward about the fact that we created the offshore structure, but with respect to the Isle of Man, there are other offshore structures that were available at the time that were not KPMG offshore structures.

Finance committee  That's correct. We are not in any way connected to the “sword” companies. There are a few emails in which Ms. Georgeson actually contradicts herself. In one email she says that Cordery was only the service provider for KPMG, when we know that Cordery was also the service provider for nine other non-KPMG OCSs and was also the service provider for the “sword” companies, which we had no involvement in.

Finance committee  With respect to Mount Real, it was not a client of KPMG. With respect to Norshield, we were the auditor of a fund that is in a chain of funds with respect to Norshield. That fund was Olympus. When we were the auditors, there was a sophisticated fraud that was undertaken at Olympus, and unfortunately we didn't uncover that.

Finance committee  Thank you. RSM International were the receivers with respect to that Olympus United Funds Corporation, and their view was that we should have caught the fraud. Unfortunately, we did not catch the fraud and we did settle with respect to Olympus. We paid $7.5 million to the receiver.

Finance committee  Unfortunately, it's not a yes or a no answer, Mr. Fast. It's a very complex tax act. The last time I looked, it was over 2,300 pages. With respect to the offshore structure, the offshore structure very much operated like a non-resident trust, which was very much accepted by the government.

Finance committee  Mr. Fast, with respect to the offshore structure, again, it's very complex. It's not just a yes-or-no answer.

Finance committee  The program was terminated because we very much felt that the landscape was changing. We very much felt that it was legal, and it also passed the GAAR testing, but at the time, KPMG was very much changing its views with respect to tax and what was acceptable from a responsibility perspective.

Finance committee  I understand that our U.S. member firm did face penalties with respect to that occurrence, and I understand that this had implications for the types of services it was able to provide.

Finance committee  With respect, again, we have no connection with Cinar and with the “sword” companies, whether directly or indirectly. I'm a tax adviser; I'm not a specialist with respect to fraud. I couldn't even begin to explain how to prevent something like this.