Okay, thank you.
Obviously, I was very concerned every time one of these stories came out or when my MP's office was made aware of service-related issues. Personally, I think that whistle-blowers who expose all these fraud schemes are doing a useful service to democracy. It is good for the health of our democracy to ensure transparency in this area. However, after seeing the messages being sent out by Mr. Hamilton, the CRA and you, I wondered whether you were going after the fraudsters or the whistle-blowers. That was the impression we got when we read the news reports.
My time is almost up for this first round, but I have a request to pass on to you. My colleague, Jean-Denis Garon, the Bloc Québécois critic for national revenue currently on parental leave, wrote to you this summer with a request. Six months have passed and, in the meantime, several other items of information have been made public. Earlier on, you referred to a section of the Income Tax Act. However, section 231.4 of that act grants the minister responsible for the CRA the power to authorize an external investigator to conduct an investigation. Considering the many revelations made in the media over the past year, especially last fall, I'd like to reiterate this request so that we can get to the bottom of this matter. You say that teams are putting fraud strategies in place, but I get the impression that fraud cases are more frequent than ever and that the problem is not going away.
Only you have that authority. Are you considering using it?