As you rightly said, we report to Parliament. That is per our enabling legislation, the Nuclear Safety and Control Act. The minister, as I said, has no role in our decision-making or in our day-to-day operations.
The CNSC has horizontal relationships with many departments—including the two witnesses following us—such as Environment and Climate Change Canada, the Impact Assessment Agency, Health Canada, Transport Canada, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, as well as our provincial agencies in environment and labour.
I want to emphasize that one reason I've heard in previous appearances is a concern about optics; that NRCan is responsible for promotion, and why would the regulator be reporting to that? However, as I've explained, our reporting is, in a way, strictly for us to get to Parliament with no political interference in our decision-making.
We did some public polling in 2020, when we reached out to Canadians, civil society organizations, licensees, host communities, scientists and intervenors, because we were trying to get a baseline on what Canadians' confidence and trust is in the regulator. The reporting relationship was never raised as an issue by anyone. Similarly, the international review that was done in 2019 never raised our reporting as a concern in terms of our independence or as compromising it in any way.
I've been a commission member and a president for 11 years. Whichever minister we report to, that's a decision of the Governor in Council. I can't see it making any difference in how we carry out our mandate.
I hope that helps.