Mr. Speaker, it is always a problem in any legislation to define public interest. I think we can go into any department and any minister's portfolio and sometimes those who think they are protecting the public interest are being lax and there are those also who sometimes are perhaps going too far to protect the public interest.
It is definitely a difficult term to define. I do agree that we would have to be very careful in defining it to ensure we do not jeopardize, in particular, our soldiers as was mentioned. I think there are probably times that it has to be defined or exemptions perhaps have to be made, and this motion does give us some direction.
We do, first and foremost, need to have the public interest in mind and many times some of the decisions that are made are not in the best interest of the public. However, on military and CSIS decisions we should be able to determine what is in the public interest. At least we have an opportunity with this motion to know what is in the best public interest. In situations such as the spending, one of the areas where we were going with this motion, is that the public interest has not been taken into account.