As it happens, Mr. Desjarlais talked about how important this oversight work is. It's very important that it remain in the hands of the Office of the Auditor General. The Auditor General had access to the information and at our February 6 meeting she answered questions from committee members about why the wastage was occurring. She said it was a distribution issue, and we heard that from several government officials as well. The details of this testimony are available. They said there was always wastage, first because it's a very fragile product, and second because it was delivered in 48 hours and there were issues with logistics, distribution and data sharing.
That's what we heard in the Auditor General's testimony on the issues encountered. She never indicated that the problem was the contracts and that she could not disclose those because of the confidentiality agreement. In fact, I can't believe that if there were problem provisions in the contract, she wouldn't have been able to tell us. That's not what she concluded at all. She felt that the departments had worked well together to get enough doses of vaccine so that 82% of Canadians would receive at least two doses. In terms of the wastage that occurred afterwards, I remember Mr. Desjarlais asking some very good questions about that, and some lessons were certainly learned from that.
The agreement the government is negotiating with the provinces focuses on better data sharing and greater health care cooperation. I believe everyone knows that if another pandemic comes along, we should be ready and we shouldn't just wait until it happens. It's urgent. So I can't underestimate the work of the Office of the Auditor General, although I also understand that parliamentary privilege exists.
I've said it before, and I want to say it again: It really bothers me when people talk about the work of the public service with apprehension or directly or indirectly suggest that it has not acted with integrity. What I really like about this committee is we ask questions respectfully, but we always rely on the work of the Office of the Auditor General. We can trust their data and their findings. We can dig into them and work to do things better in the future.
In that respect, I think about what this committee has already accomplished. We do studies, for example, a study on the report of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development. I was delighted to work on that with Ms. Sinclair‑Desgagné. We have worked together on other projects to advance the work of this committee.
I am pretty much always ready to compromise. I follow the committee's mandate by the book. I feel we should stick to the mandate to the letter. On the other hand, I agree with the argument that has been and is being expressed. It's very important that this committee ensure that these contracts have been properly entered into. Despite our confidence in the Auditor General, this is an issue that we should at least look at. I have some experience in this area—I used to be a commercial banker—but I have to say I'm far from being an expert.