You make a very important point, that public confidence in the RCMP is absolutely key to its ability to carry out its important policing and law enforcement functions in Canadian society.
I have been on record in a number of different contexts that I see the public inquiry as an extraordinary vehicle that should not easily be ordered or taken up by governments, because I think sometimes governments can offload their own issues around political accountability to a public inquiry, if you like to get them off the government's agenda and into a venue where in fact usually a judicial officer, or an officer with certain exceptional powers, is allowed to do his or her work without comment on the part, one would hope, of either government or opposition. So as I said, I've been on record; I think public inquiries can play an important role in getting to the bottom of matters.
Certainly when Paul Martin was Prime Minister, he specifically asked that I get to the bottom of what happened to Maher Arar, because there were so many conflicting and incomplete statements and rumours and things happening. So in that case, but only after a very thorough review of other alternatives, did I and my then colleague Minister of Justice Cotler conclude that the public inquiry was actually the right vehicle, and the only vehicle in the context of that case, by which you could get to the bottom of what happened.
I think it depends on the situation, and it depends on the minister recommending to his cabinet colleagues as to whether he or she believes it is a situation of such sufficient complexity, ambiguity, conflict in terms of the facts and other things—