We recently brought into effect the Federal Accountability Act , one component of which was protection for whistle-blowers. When we were doing that, we actually ensured that there was going to be whistle-blower protection for RCMP personnel. That's now in the statutes. It exists. It's there.
When we were in the process of creating that legislation, we heard testimony from RCMP officials that they needed a separate path for whistle-blower protection that would cause personnel in their organization to go internally first.
Everywhere else in the public service we structured the whistle-blower protection in a way that public servants could go directly to the independent officer of Parliament for both a disclosure and for subsequent protection. But we made an exception in the RCMP because of the unique paramilitary structure, and allowed for them to go through the internal process before going to the independent officer of Parliament.
It's an improvement, because before that there was no whistle-blower protection in law for RCMP personnel, period. However, the more I've gone through this process, the less convinced I am that we--and I mean all of us, because all parties supported that--made the right decision in stipulating that RCMP personnel had to go through an internal process first.
I can't see any reason why RCMP personnel should not have the ability to go straight to the independent Public Service Integrity Officer with their disclosures or with their complaints of bullying. Can any of you persuade me to the contrary, or do you agree?