Madam Speaker, while I agree with the general tenor of the caveats that the hon. member for Kings--Hants has put forward, I do want to express my concern about one thing he said in his latest response to the last question he was asked. This is the question of getting involved in non-publicly traded investments at an early stage.
If we are concerned about the potential for the board to act in a manner that is subject to political ends, that is subject to pressures from outside and so on, then surely the one area we do not want to go into is publicly traded commodities because at that point we are dealing with an area where there is no market price to be established. An oversight, even if there is open reporting, is virtually impossible.
As an historian I have studied pension systems elsewhere. I am unaware of any jurisdiction in the world where a public pension has been invested successfully in this manner and has produced satisfactory rates of return. I was wondering if the member is aware of any to expand our knowledge on this point?