I think there is probably more than one way to handle what you do with a situation of that sort, who you talk to and who you engage, but in my mind, you can't go wrong by taking it to the Clerk of the Privy Council. The clerk, in our system, wears a lot of different hats. He runs the Privy Council Office, which is effectively the Prime Minister's department. In that sense, he's like a deputy minister. However, he is also head of the public service. He has that responsibility, which is system-wide. It means that he is able to marshal whatever resources need to be marshalled within the PCO or outside of the PCO, to make sure that the right people are involved and the right institutions are involved, and to get the best possible advice in the system about what to do.
He's also secretary to the cabinet. Here you have a situation where a minister has had this exchange with the ombudsman, which I think everyone would agree is unusual and not a normal occurrence. In his role facilitating the work of ministers around the cabinet table, and making sure that institutionally ministers know where they are and what they need to do, he was also well situated in that role. He wears these multiple hats, and in a way each of them was relevant to this issue.
Frankly, you go to the top because you want to make sure that, to the extent there's anything that can be done, it is done immediately and the right way. The way to do that in our system is certainly to rely on the clerk. I certainly had confidence that he would do that. Nothing about how he responded to me ever made me doubt that.