Thank you, Chair.
The reality is people were dying, and as a result, I can tell you that I appreciate the tone taken by all my colleagues here today, on all sides of the House, certainly by the Auditor General's department and the various ministries, in dealing with what obviously is just not a normal situation. The urgency is clearly identified.
Accept in reality that we had to invest in new military vehicles, that those vehicles could and quite frankly have saved lives. That reality demonstrates clearly, in each and every case, a need for speed. In this particular case, that was clearly defined.
As such, though, we have to be accountable. This is public accounts, and as such, I have a question for the Auditor General based on a clarification on a statement made by Mr. Fonberg. He states, “...we all understood that Canadian lives were at stake.” Decisions were made regarding risk:
But we assumed the risks of working this way because the risks to our troops in delay or non-action were far greater. However, we never looked at the urgency as a licence to be sloppy in our processes. We never looked at the urgency as a reason to withhold information.
To the Auditor General, at any time did you feel that information was either held back or you were given measured responses or due diligence was not performed?