Thank you very much, Chair.
I want to make a note of what you just said and I'm going to come back to that.
Let's put a focus to this. Mr. Williams is trying to suggest that this is only a gathering of folks with no real purpose. The fact is that we did deal with this once in a chapter review. We found serious problems. The Auditor General--I want to remind everybody--on February 26 of this year said in her opening remarks:
We found serious weaknesses at almost all levels in the processes set up to ensure the security of government information in assets entrusted to industry.
And on the same day, Mr. Scott Stevenson, the acting ADM at the time, said:
I have just outlined a number of specific actions the department has undertaken or will undertake to address the concerns raised by the audit. I can assure you that the Department of National Defence is committed to ensuring that sensitive information and assets entrusted to industry through contracting are properly safeguarded. As a result of the Auditor General's report, the Department of National Defence is making significant improvements to our security provisions.
We had our meeting and we had not yet met to write our report. In the interim, along come these headlines showing that these plans are in the garbage. We've brought you back here to find out where we are on this issue. Is it closer to the opening comments that the Auditor General made, that things are serious and there are weaknesses and this is another example of that? Or are the comments that everything is fine true, and we don't need to worry about anything? Or were we given nice little assurances, patted on the head, and the reality is that we still have continuing weaknesses? Hence the hearing to find out which of those two applications would apply vis-à-vis these blueprints being found in the garbage; let's understand this.
I understand the point being made that they weren't classified as...is “secure” the correct term?