It seems, Mr. Chair, like there's so much prevarication around Mr. Clark's role that it strikes the committee—and I think I can speak for some of my colleagues at least—that there's an attempt to construct a story that has a semblance of credibility, when in actual fact Mr. Clark was fairly involved in the process. He wasn't just aware that a process was happening; he had some role in green-lighting the process and, in fact, may have been instrumental in the process.
You know, it's frustrating for me, because perhaps I differ a little bit from my Conservative colleagues in the question of whether the purchase of that property was in Canada's best interest and whether it was a good decision. Really, this study has evolved into a study about the process and whether people are telling the truth about Mr. Clark's role. That should be something that people are very concerned about if they're watching this, because we have a set of facts and assertions that are frankly unbelievable. It's unbelievable that a senior civil servant would write a memo and misuse phrases like giving a green light or being “instrumental”. We're in this strange situation where we have testimony that doesn't line up and where we're forced to make conclusions based on inconsistent testimony provided by Mr. Clark and by you today.
I don't have any more questions, other than to say that it's really disappointing that we haven't been able to get to the bottom of what happened. Instead, we're stuck making assumptions.
I'll hand it back to you, Mr. Chair.