Thank you, Chair.
First of all, I just want to mention to Mr. Whalen who used a sort of common-sense approach—and I appreciate that—in the comments to say, hey, maybe politicians should decide what gets studied. I appreciate where that's coming from, but I can assure you that one of the golden rules of public accounts is the independence of the Office of the Auditor General to choose what it goes into. Otherwise we're into a whole other nightmare scenario in which it is being guided by politics. That independence is crucial, and I think that's what the chair was emphasizing, but I understand where you're coming from. I just needed to make that point. That's a golden rule with us: we can recommend, and when it's unanimous that office pays serious attention to it, but, at the end of the day the law says the office is independent and decides where to go, not us.
I had, I think, actually criticized the media—which is really stupid if you're running again, but I'm not. However, when I am trying to get something, doing that is just as stupid, and I don't want to do that. I'm imploring—that is more the tone I should have taken—the national media to please help us and pay attention to this. We need the public to focus on Parliament's plight here.
I want to give a shout-out. I mentioned Andrew Coyne, and he was good enough to tweet it, but Marie-Danielle Smith was the one at Postmedia who did a story immediately afterwards and then a follow-up one. I could have lived without the hook that created the story, but it got the story out there. That's what matters, and it's much appreciated.
I can tell you that within the auditing, accountability, oversight and transparency of government community, it was noted and appreciated. So, hopefully, we can get others to understand the importance of this.