Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question. As I pointed out a moment ago, a bill is never perfect when first tabled. Obviously, our caucus, through our health critic, the hon. member for New Brunswick Southwest, will certainly make extremely efficient efforts to put forward amendments concerning the administrative structure.
As part of my work on this issue, I met with many specialists in medical research, and it is true that these are people able to assume a lot of responsibilities. They do not want handouts. They are able to make interesting proposals, in relation to both the areas where research should be encouraged and management.
They will certainly have an opportunity to share their views with the committee, and my colleague will be able to propose amendments. This will allow us to come to an agreement on the main thrust of Bill C-13, which is to encourage health research by establishing research institutes. It will also enable us to create thousands of research application related jobs for young people looking for structural jobs.
We are dealing with a scientific community which is used to taking charge and which did not always get the support it needed. I am convinced that my colleague's wish will be fulfilled by the government, because the government's goal should be to encourage people who can carry out good research and create jobs. Ultimately, I am sure all Canadians will appreciate and benefit from that.
It would be interesting to give researchers more scientific responsibilities, and also administrative ones, so that politicians can step back from the appointment process.
We are entering an era where political appointments will become less and less acceptable. I have been reviewing the Canada Elections Act. Just yesterday, we talked about returning officers. For the last hundred years, they have been appointed by each successive governing party, but we are now wondering whether it would be better to have a process whereby the best candidates would be appointed to these positions.
With respect to the establishment of institutes, the best would be to have an objective mechanism in place to appoint the people with the greatest expertise, who can deliver and achieve the goals set out in the bill.