Mr. Speaker, I do enjoy working with my colleague opposite on the Standing Committee on Public Accounts. We had the opportunity to review various reports through the course of the year provided by the Auditor General. Clearly this one report on railway safety was one of great concern to all of us. Certainly the issue of Lac-Mégantic was one that brought focus to our committee and functionally to all Canadians on the terrible tragedy that occurred in that environment.
When we studied the recommendations of the Auditor General's report, it is important to know first of all that Transport Canada, the minister and her officials accepted the recommendations of the Auditor General and moved very quickly to put many new safety regulations in place that would ensure that a situation such as the horror of Lac-Mégantic would not reoccur.
More importantly, I would like to point out to the member and I think he will agree with me, that the focus was taken off inspections. While inspectors are critical for day-to-day operations, there was a greater focus put on longer-term audit. Clearly, Transport Canada has increased the number of auditors within that organization by some 85% in very short order. The training is ongoing and is very substantial as they work to create a longer-term view of establishing safety operations within railways. The report that came out of that Auditor General's report by the committee truly acknowledged those changes.