I respect Mr. Maloney's comments; however, a significant portion of the report is already started. We had been working on it prior to you joining the committee.
Quite honestly, I appreciate the conversation around the table. I think there's a balance we have to strike. I respect my francophone colleagues and their need to have access to the information that they feel is important, but I also agree that we need to move forward as expeditiously as possible, in line with Senator Harder's and Mr. Green's comments about getting at the report and doing it in an expeditious manner.
However, I've put myself in the position of my colleagues Mr. Fortin and Senator Carignan, and quite honestly, I'm troubled that we don't have more documents that were translated at the commission. It's for them to make that decision. If I were in their shoes, I would probably have the same position. I'd be concerned that I might miss something.
As Senator Smith said, we're here for the Canadian public, and that means we're supposed to study the exercise of the authorities invoking the act. That's different from what the commission explored, and we should be doing that as expeditiously as possible but also as thoroughly as possible.
I think the compromise that Mr. Brock brings forward is an opportunity to get more documents translated for our francophone colleagues. It allows an opportunity for us all to explore those documents. They may be of value or they may not be of value; we don't know for sure yet.
My goal is still to have this report done by the end of June. That does not appear to be possible, but early fall is reasonable for sure, and in fairness to both official languages, I think we need to have some sort of compromise.
Those are my thoughts at this time.