Mr. Speaker, I was unable to discern a specific question or two with respect to the comments, but let me react to a few things the member said earlier.
To begin, she spoke about the question of CIDA and whether or not CIDA has a particular mandate, a specific mandate, a legislated mandate. This is an interesting question. As a former lawyer who has performed a lot of international development work, who has acted in an executive capacity for CIDA and whose own spouse spent five years working for CIDA, I find that an interesting comment when 1,100 employees of the Canadian International Development Agency and several thousand consultants do not believe they have a mandate.
The mandate of CIDA is crystal clear. It is informed by a series of principles and objectives, including the sustainable development of the planet, as CIDA pursues its development projects all over the world in dozens and dozens of countries.
The second fact the member has omitted to share with the House is the fact that many and in fact dozens of government departments have international activities. Each of these is coordinated through and under the auspices of the Department of Foreign Affairs, which is another reason why we needed to hive off and form a separate department. It was so we could better manage what is happening at Agriculture Canada, at Environment Canada or at the Treasury Board in terms of international projects and in terms of technical assistance which is going on all over the world. This is a strengthening of our capacity to deal with these internal management challenges.
Furthermore, just to be very clear, how can the governor in council simply create a new department? Does Parliament not have to approve a new department? The creation of new departments occurred within the statutory framework provided by Parliament. Under the authority of the Public Service Rearrangement and Transfer of Duties Act, this governor in council has the ability to transfer portions of the public service and ministerial powers, duties and functions from one part of the public service to another or from one minister to another.