There is a lot of debate on to what extent deputy ministers report directly to parliamentary committees. The academics--or some of them, anyway--say deputy ministers should account to Parliament only for those responsibilities that are statutorily or authoritatively told to them.
My view is what Commissioner Gomery missed and the academics aren't that clued in about: the concept of management control, which simply means causing to happen that which should and causing not to happen that which shouldn't.
I believe the minister is ultimately responsible for the quality of management control. The ministers collectively do appoint the deputy ministers. I know the Prime Minister does, but it's still the ministry's responsibility to put in place deputies who know what management control is and set in place the control processes that make sure that what's supposed to happen does and what isn't supposed to happen doesn't.
I'm proposing something that's probably new, that the deputies as well as the ministers report to the House on what their whistle-blower protection practices actually are and whether they think their protection practices are doing the job. I'm claiming that without that public accountability you don't get that self-regulating influence on their conduct.
In my view--and I've put this in writing in several places--if we don't have that direct accountability reporting by the ministers and the deputies on whistle-blowing, forget whistle-blower protection; it won't happen.