Thank you.
Commissioner, I want to follow up on the questions Mr. Bigras is raising. I'm very troubled, and I'm hoping this isn't a trend showing what's going to happen, particularly in the climate change area. I'm particularly concerned about the implications of passing information through ministerial briefs, so that you can't gain access for evaluation. That is critical to the delivery of your responsibilities under your statutes, but it is also critical to transparency to the public, because we're dealing with very serious chemicals—in the case of benzene, of course, a major carcinogen; and the government has yet to regulate mercury, an even more critical carcinogen; and in the case of greenhouse gases, a serious problem.
I'm wondering, and I'll go back to the question I raised before, whether or not you thought there might be value in providing more specific, prescribed legal requirements to the departments and agencies, including the Department of Finance, concerning what they have to provide back. If there's going to be increasing reliance on economic measures and voluntary agreements and not on the normal regulatory tools, then it's incumbent upon agencies to also be forthcoming in the way they analyze the efficacy of those instruments to deliver, both on cost and in how they deliver.
I note that in the United States, when the federal government transfers money to the U.S. states, if they don't deliver on that program the federal government can yank the money back and can move in and do its own enforcement. So I'm very concerned about the issues you're raising. You're saying you believe it's only one example and that you haven't necessarily seen a trend, but this may be an indicator of a problem to come, and it perhaps needs to be clarified through clear regulations or requirements to provide information or access to analyses.