Mr. Speaker, part of the issue the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca has outlined is the fact that perhaps the model that has been suggested in the legislation is not the one that will give sufficient oversight.
Although this is not what has been proposed, I want to refer to the annual report of the Commission for Public Complaints for 2011-2012. In that report there are a whole series of recommendations that the commission has been putting forward to the government for a number of years and they still remain outstanding. These range from a policy on releasing details regarding sensitive investigations, which has been outstanding since February 2008, and a policy dealing with requests for exhibits consistent with the Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Act, March 2009. A whole series of recommendations have been outstanding for a number of years.
It points to part of the problem when there is not that independence, that direct reporting to Parliament. If there were direct reporting to Parliament on matters like this, then Parliament would not only respond to the report, but also be in a better position to hold the government of the day to account, whichever government that might be, for those recommendations that have been made.