Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Minister, you say that this budget breaks new ground. Bill C-59 does break new ground, because it retroactively makes legal an act that was illegal in the past when it was committed.
With regard to division 18 and the retroactive changes to the long-gun registry, effectively in 2012, when Parliament passed a law to destroy certain records in the long-gun registry, the law when it was passed made no mention of the Access to Information Act. Because of that omission, the records in question actually can't be destroyed until after any pre-existing access to information cases were closed. Now, the law was perhaps badly written, but it has been the law since April 2012.
In May 2012 the public safety minister's head of the RCMP promised that the RCMP would abide by the access to information law in this matter, yet six months later the RCMP actually broke the law and destroyed those records.
Who ordered the RCMP to break the law and destroy those records? Was it the public safety minister or the Prime Minister?