You raise a lot of points.
I just want to mention that I remembered your colleague's question in the meantime. Of course, Canadian companies engage in transfer pricing because they are always trumpeting the fact that it's legal. I'm not sure which newspapers your colleague reads, but it happens every day. All he has to do is read Jean-François Cloutier's articles in the Journal de Montréal—he's a fairly easy read—and he'll see that, every week, some new tax haven scandal or another is breaking.
As for out-of-court settlements, they are very contentious. I won't quote legal experts, but those in sociology and philosophy of law circles are quite concerned. What troubles them is the fact that the tendency towards out-of-court settlements deprives us of jurisprudence and ultimately transforms the law into a type of narrow-minded logic that relies on haggling and the balance of power. It's no longer the law being applied. Oftentimes, in settlement conferences, the mediator, who may be a judge, will point out that the purpose is not for the parties to assert their rights but, rather, to renounce them. The basis for out-of-court settlements is having the parties renounce their rights, and that's a really big problem. If you want to get into the philosophical arguments, we could have a fine debate, indeed. It's a very serious problem from a philosophy of law standpoint.
I wasn't trying to attack the Prime Minister. I simply wanted to make clear that most countries around the world are interested in the structure behind tax havens, not just the administrative measures that can be taken domestically. Clearly, it's encouraging to see the new government invest in the Canada Revenue Agency. That said, given the many cuts the agency has endured in the past, all this money is doing is restoring the balance. The government has armed itself with slingshots to fight a massive problem, one that requires special attention from both the Department of Finance and the Prime Minister's Office instead of disclosure mechanisms, which, despite carrying some weight, are not enough.
As far as Europe is concerned, the debate is raging. It's a tremendous challenge. It's a fact that, in Europe, Luxembourg literally soaks up the tax revenues of other governments by allowing companies that operate in the European Union to record their profits in the grand duchy, even though all of their operations are located elsewhere and they benefit from taxpayer-funded public infrastructure in those countries. When all is said and done, we are missing the boat in a big way.