Mr. Chair, I'd like to say something, because I think there are two issues, here.
The first issue is what Mr. Godin and Mrs. Vignola talked about. It's not acceptable for the French version to have more redactions or for it to be incomplete. Nor is it acceptable for a deputy minister to use language like that. He doesn't seem to be aware of the fact that he has an obligation to provide the committee with the documents in both official languages. Clearly, that's a problem. Perhaps we should ask the person who signed the letter to appear before the committee so we can explain it to him.
The second issue has to do with the fact that we asked organizations across government for thousands of documents at the same time. Depending on the government's contractual policies, those documents aren't necessarily available in both official languages at the time that the committee requests them, obviously. Under one policy, the subcontracting business with the company can be carried out in the official language of the company's choice. A company could very well have a series of contracts in French or in English, so any contracts and related materials requested by the committee would need to be translated. In this case, we are talking about having hundreds of thousands of pages, if I'm not mistaken, translated into French or English.
Clearly, that isn't easy to do, so the committee should take that into consideration. If we are going to set tight deadlines, it's almost impossible for an organization to provide the committee with properly translated documents. If the committee's priority is to ensure that organizations meet the deadlines we impose or that they provide a wide array of documents—as opposed to specific documents—it can make things worse. That's what happened here, with the translation of all these documents.
I think the responsibility here is shared between the departments and the committee, because of the deadlines we set and the huge number of documents we requested.
However, with respect to translation quality and the deputy minister's intent in his letter, I think we should ask him to appear before the committee to explain his letter. We can report to the House on the translation issue, because it's important.
On the question of the documents themselves, Mr. Chair, I want to make sure. I think it's mostly you I'm hoping will have the action item here. To me, there are a couple of questions.
McKinsey originally delivered documents that were redacted. Then we went back to McKinsey and we said to McKinsey, “No, that is not acceptable. Please provide us with documents that are not redacted, and we will give you a chance to justify to us what shouldn't be made public based on the documents you now give us”, which McKinsey then agreed to.
I am not 100% sure, but it doesn't seem to me that we've clearly stated that to government departments. My request to you, Mr. Chair, is that I think the next step would be to go back to the government departments and say, “We asked you for non-redacted documents. We sent the same letter to everybody, and you have not delivered non-redacted documents. McKinsey has delivered all the documents in non-redacted format. PSPC, the main department, has delivered their documents in a non-redacted format. We fully expect you to comply with this order and deliver us non-redacted documents. In the event that you believe some of the provisions should not ever be made public, please provide the committee with all of the reasons that part shouldn't be made public, and we would be delighted to consider all of your requests. Provide us with this by X date.”
If they don't comply at that point, I'd be happy to say that it would get referred, but I would like to give a clear directive to the chair to go back to the departments with a very clear message to each of the departments that has not complied, exactly as you did with McKinsey.
To me, on that part, on the documents part, Mr. Chair, I'd like to see that as the next step as opposed to just sending this report to the House.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.