Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
When it comes to ethics, we must always be careful to avoid prejudice. That's why it takes a good dose of humility to get to the bottom of things.
What troubles us all, of course, is that a number of versions of the same story were given by the Prime Minister's entourage or by the Prime Minister himself. The multiple versions are preventing us from determining what happened. We certainly cannot and should not take the commissioner's place. The commissioner must first respond to Mr. Barrett's letter, which will tell us whether or not an investigation will be held. It's up to him to tell us.
As far as we're concerned, we certainly shouldn't forget one thing: The Conflict of Interest Act was enacted in 2006 and the Conflict of Interest Code for Members of the House of Commons was written in 2007. Some revisions have been made, but the fact is, time does pass and circumstances do change. We would do well to ask the commissioner whether certain rules regarding gifts, travel and vacations should be reviewed, because the standard practice at one time may no longer be the standard practice today. You must understand that the wording of the law is imprinted, but life is not.
As a committee, we can also undertake a review of the act, should the commissioner agree to it. One thing's for sure, it's not up to us to investigate a particular situation once the commissioner has been informed of a problem and must himself rule on the merits of holding an investigation. As Mr. Blaikie said, I think at some point we will get the results of the commissioner's investigation and we can discuss it with him at that time.
For now, we need to be careful. We're theoretically operating without prejudice, but we're also faced with facts that don't all add up, and that doesn't sit well with us. I believe the commissioner is the only person who can ease this discomfort by explaining the rules on gifts, vacations and travel. We must also leave him to pursue his investigation as he sees fit. As Mr. Blaikie said, if he is currently conducting an investigation, he'll tell us he can't comment. However, that doesn't mean we can't start thinking about gifts, vacations and travel.