Thank you, again.
I feel it's bit unfair asking you guys to answer all of these questions when you had nothing to do with putting this in Bill C-44 to begin with. You were not consulted; it came from the Prime Minister's Office, maybe from the Minister of Finance. Wherever it came from, it is disappointing.
I'm a big fan of the PBO. I believe this is a breath of fresh air. We can go to a body that is independent, that can give the information we need in order to assist us, as parliamentarians, to be effective in everything we do. At the end of the day, we all want to serve Canada in a different and good way.
The technical question is about the changes in section 79.4. Why would the access to information provisions not allow the PBO to compel institutions and departments to provide requested information? We know that the only effective way for us, as parliamentarians, to get that information is for the PBO to have that ability to talk to different departments and to be able to enforce their way to pull some information for doing the job properly.
To your knowledge, why do you believe this change to section 79.4 was proposed?