Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that the commission is examining a rather complex matter, that being the events that took place in Somalia, what happened before the troops were sent on the mission and, obviously, what happened after the incidents that took place were discovered, which Canadians categorically reject.
The only question in my mind, and I hope my hon. colleague will understand this, is whether at some point Canadians interested in knowing what went on in Somalia would like to have a historical document. The commission has been sitting for almost two years. We have never commented on the list of witnesses; we have not commented on the schedule; the commission of inquiry on Somalia was granted three extensions, it was originally supposed to hand in its report by the end of December 1995.
In my opinion, Canadians are interested in how we are going to react in the future, should such incidents happen again. They want to be sure that there is not a repetition of all the problems we have heard about and discovered during this inquiry.
If the Leader of the Opposition is interested in a historical document, we in the government are prepared to take action and think that the time has come to take steps to learn what the commission has done, to evaluate its recommendations and to try to do whatever we can to avoid a recurrence of such events.