Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to thank our guests for their work and for sharing their precious time with us.
One of the most significant aspects of the work we do in this committee involves examining the way money is spent. So, I would like to talk specifically about numbers. Almost $50 million was spent on these projects. Of that amount, almost $30 million was spent in the Municipality of Huntsville.
I am looking specifically at the two most expensive projects, including the supposed media centre that ultimately was not used for that. It was made 6,500 square meters larger to include an olympic-size skating rink—I fail to see how reporters would have found the time to play hockey—with a capacity of 1,400. Almost $17 million was spent on that project. The other one involved a facility at the University of Waterloo that has not been used by students thus far, as reported in an article that recently appeared in the Globe and Mail.
The problem with all of this is that I cannot ask you whether we received value for money, because you made the point quite eloquently that this was not part of your mandate and that you did not concern yourself with what happened subsequently. In your opinion, when the decisions were being made as to how the money would be spent, were the proper procedures followed to ensure there would be good value for money, not only in relation to the G8, but also for future generations?