Thank you very much.
First of all let me thank you for being here and for all the good work you do on our behalf, in terms of the RCMP and the Canadian Forces.
I have two questions. One is the budget question. The budget started out from about $175 million when I was in cabinet in those days when it was approved, and now it's about $1 billion, give or take $100 million. I would like to know what your guesstimate is as to where it might end up. Would it stay there or might it increase?
Let me ask you the second question so you can answer both. If there's time left over, my colleague Mr. Wilfert might have a question.
The other question is about the RCMP dealing with some activists in a way that I would say is somewhat un-Canadian and disturbing. I'm going to read you a portion of the editorial from Kevin Brooker of the Calgary Herald from this month, I think October 26. It tells of 24-year-old student Danika Surm, who was approached outside of her classroom by two plainclothes constables.
Their curious mission went roughly like this: We understand you're friends with Chris Shaw. What do you know about the man, his activities and his associations? Surm, feeling very uncomfortable about all of this, said little, largely because she has little to tell. She is but a casual friend of Shaw, who happens to be known as Vancouver's most conspicuous opponent of the Games. For the record, though, it should be noted that Shaw is hardly some face-masked firebrand. He is a respected professor of neuroscience at UBC whose website, 2010watch.com, publishes reasonable, well-buttressed critiques of all manner of political chicanery and unsustainable practices connected with the Games. Shaw, of course, has been ambushed by investigators in the same manner as Surm. So have many others who have been identified as Olympic naysayers. They're calling it a witch hunt, and some are even threatening to sue the ISU. It's not difficult to see that this is harassment, pure and simple. Take Surm's harrowing experience. When she refused to give police her cell number, they nevertheless called her on that phone the next day. And when Shaw travelled to London recently to give a talk, he was taken aside at Heathrow and grilled extensively on what he intended to say.
I'm just reading you part of it; all of it is available on the net.
I would like you to respond to that and tell me how that fits into what you say. You say this is not a security event with athletes but a sporting event with security.