Mr. Speaker, I take it that the hon. member is referring to the process of police investigations.
Police conduct investigations but when any police force in the country wishes to make inquiries of a foreign authority or a foreign government, the practice is to come to the international assistance group of the Department of Justice to communicate that request to the foreign government. In those circumstances, the lawyers and the senior officials of the international assistance group meet with the police and determine that there is a reasonable basis for taking the next step in the investigation, which is to ask a foreign authority for assistance. Once that is done, then the lawyers in the international assistance group work with the police in formulating that request and send it abroad.