Mr. Chair, I think it's simply a matter of our saying that there are some limitations. There are limitations concerning people who are bringing forward complaints of reprisals against PSIC and there are limitations in our ability to get access to information.
We think those two things need to be fixed. They don't necessarily need to be fixed so that they are done by us. The mandate could be removed from us and done by some sort of independent investigator as well.
Really, I'm not suggesting one or the other. I think the work that we have done under the investigations we have done well, but we are limited in what we can do. Anything that expanded our mandate would, as I've said in my opening statement, have an impact upon our resources.
If people from outside the public service were able to bring complaints about PSIC's work to us or if we were able to get reprisal complaints from PSIC employees, it doesn't necessarily mean that we would end up doing more investigations. It would mean, however, that we would have to assess more complaints, and all of that takes time.
Similarly, though, if Parliament decided to put in place some sort of independent process, there would be a cost to that as well.
I'm thus not advocating one or the other. I would be happy to work within whichever framework Parliament decides they want us to work in. I think, though, there would need to be a recognition that if we were asked to do more, there would be an impact. Right now the only way we could get the resources to do this would be to reduce the performance audits that we present to Parliament.