No. But to be fair to the witness, this is an area in which reasonable persons may disagree. Where does the discretion or the power or the mandate of the Auditor General end and the discretion exercised by the government begin? Is there a fine line between the two? Arguably, there isn't.
My concern with the view expressed by the Clerk of the Privy Council, for whom of course I, like everyone else in this room, have enormous respect for his knowledge of government and the machinery of government.... My concern with the view expressed in this letter, particularly in the fourth paragraph at the end of the first page, is that if vacancies or the incidence of vacancies is beyond the mandate of the Auditor General to consider, one could have a situation where the vacancy rate is very high for whatever reason, either the political decision of the government of the day or just being unable to get on with the process competently. This argument would suggest that it's no interest of the Auditor General on behalf of the House to express concern to the House, or it's no place of the House, inferentially, to take an interest in such a matter.
It seems to me that sort of argument--that vacancies, per se, are beyond the process--invites the conclusion that a situation I described would be beyond the purview of the Auditor General or the House to comment upon. And it seems to me, in the sense that the Auditor General is an agent of the House and the House acts in the public interest, that a high vacancy rate might, as a matter of public policy, be something that would concern the House. It might be something under subsection 7(2) of the act on which the Auditor General wanted to comment.