Mr. Speaker, the government will have to answer that question directly. I cannot speculate.
I would suggest, in the spirit of transparency and openness and getting on with this process, that to proclaim Bill C-11 now would at least allow the process of the recruitment of the public service integrity officer to commence. The member is well aware of the lengthy time it is going to take to do publication nationally, to probably get a national search firm to do pre-screening and to start the process that is necessary when a bunch of officers are recruited. At the government operations and estimates committee, we went through this process extensively.
I have one final comment on the point about the spirit of corruption. I said earlier in debate that the party in power is the government, but government as defined is not just the members of Parliament who sit on that side of the House. Government also includes everyone who works for it. The buck stops there. The government is responsible for the wrongdoing of everybody who happens to work in the public service. A government could legitimately be accused of being corrupt if someone did something wrong.
There is a process going on. It is up to the courts to determine who is guilty of an offence. There have been three cases now. Two involved two ad agency executives who have been found guilty and have been prescribed jail sentences. The third case involves Mr. Guité, a public servant who was hired at the time of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. He was found guilty and has been sentenced to three and a half years. Mr. Guité has an appeal process going forward.
We are also aware that other matters have been referred to the RCMP. Further charges may be laid. We do not know that yet. The Auditor General told Canadians that Mr. Guité, in her opinion, broke every rule in the book. It appears that the courts have agreed, as did Justice Gomery. Mr. Guité has been found guilty. It appears he will be punished, as should anyone who broke any law of Canada in regard to the sponsorship program. Individuals who break our laws should face the full force of the law.