Mr. Chair, first it is important that government, like any organization that has the mandate to serve people, is continually looking at how it can do that better. That is what the President of the Treasury Board's mandate is all about and what the hard-working people at the Treasury Board are busy with on an ongoing basis.
However, to do continuous improvement, one needs to have the baseline data. We need answers to question like how we are doing: How is it working? When we tried something out, did it work? What is the evidence?
Evidence and data are important in all fields of endeavour. We want to continually keep up to date with what is happening in terms of information technology, the expectations of the public, and we want to improve our delivery of services and processes.
That relates to National Defence. Information about the impacts on some of the men and women in uniform who were in Afghanistan in an operational capacity and who were injured was being hidden. It was very difficult to find out exactly what was happening, how people were doing, and what the rates of suicide were.
It was very difficult for the previous government to do its job and improve services because the data was lacking as to what was actually happening.
With respect to the justice agenda, we know that the data and evidence clearly did not support some of the previous government's agenda. Some of the spokespersons in the United States were talking to Canadians, asking why we were going down that road of the crime and punishment agenda when the evidence did not support the long-term well-being of people in communities.
I am delighted that we will be restoring the focus on evidence-based decision-making in this country.