Yes. As I said, I don't see a distinction. If there isn't that independence, there is a risk that the police are going to be used for improper purposes.
We can look at Canadian examples, such as the public's criticism of the Ontario government's actions in directing the Ontario Provincial Police in 1995 in dealing with the Ipperwash situation. There were improper purposes and some attributed political motives, etc. Unless there is an insulation of the police to ensure that they are working independently, there is a very real risk that sort of thing will occur.
I'm currently working in countries in transition, as you'll see from my resume—in Brazil, in Uganda, and, I might mention, in the former Yugoslavia. In the war crimes cases that I prosecuted, a surprising number of them involved military police units because, with a misguided logic, the military police units of the Serbian army were often used to run the camps. They were, in fact, concentration camps. It was done, as I say, in a perverted view that this was law enforcement, so we used the police, and the police were directed to do it.
I did see in one of the hearing transcripts a suggestion that the VCDS might need this power in order to stop military policemen, as I understood it, from killing themselves by going to crime scenes to investigate in operational circumstances that did not permit that kind of investigation. Through the years, I've noticed that there are some common personality traits among police officers and military police personnel, but believe me, suicide has never been one of them.