Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to thank you for your generous comments regarding my performance in another life. I have good memories of those days.
You ask whether the political will exists. I think I more or less answered this question in my report on the report cards. I said that this culture of non-disclosure could only be changed if there were an energetic will and leadership. I cannot state this differently—there is something missing here and it is serious. Has there been a decline? The statistics published last week by Treasury Board show that there has been a decline of about 20% in the number of cases in which all the information was revealed. There has also been an increase in the use of exemptions—in other words there have been more redactions in the last two years than in the past.
To be fair, some of this is attributable to the mission in Afghanistan, if we think of the Department of National Defence and the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, for example. However, the mission in Afghanistan alone cannot account for this 20% decline.