Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to Mr. Christopherson for his comments as well.
I have an incredibly difficult time accepting that there is no information available in a usable form from the round tables and that it would take a series of months. I spent time working in the public service. I worked as a policy analyst with Treasury Board Secretariat and I was a grievance analyst with Correctional Service of Canada so I have worked on the public service side of things. I've actually worked in academia as well. Frankly, a couple of graduate students on a couple of late nights I'm sure could turn the information from the round tables into a usable format pretty darn quickly. I'm sure I could find a handful of graduate students who would be willing to do that work if Her Majesty's public service needs that help.
The fact that the public service or the minister's staff can't turn the transcripts of meetings into a usable format in a short period of time frankly shocks me. I've very certain that notes were taken of the meetings, potentially even transcripts of those meetings; and that this can't be translated and provided to the committee, shocks me. I have great faith in the public service. I think we have exceptional public servants who work hard every day. I'm very positive their internal documents, transcripts, and interim briefing notes on each of those round tables have been provided to senior public servants and to the minister's office. The fact that we're being told that there's no usable information available on a relatively small number of round tables shocks me. It honestly shocks me that no information is available. I will just leave it at that.
If the department needs some graduate students who are looking for a few hours of invaluable real-life experience in the public service, I'm willing to give an extensive list of those people who'd be willing to help the minister's office out on that.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.