Mr. Speaker, an issue my colleague raised was financial accountability. Whenever money is designated for children, we want to ensure children get that money. This is about all of us having a moral and legal responsibility to look out for children.
The Liberals have told me that the number we brought forward was created behind closed doors, or that it was pulled out of thin air. I do not know what bureaucracy Cindy Blackstock has. These numbers were given to the tribunal over eight months ago, and the government has refused to counter with any numbers of its own. If there is to be transparency and accountability, one would think that departments as big as Indian Affairs and Health Canada, which have enormous numbers of staff, could rebut Cindy Blackstock, who has a team of three or four.
We have a set of numbers laid out with respect to the shortfall and no one from the government has countered with a credible number in the nine-month period. What it is offering us now is another series of endless consultations.
What does my hon. colleague think of that? After nine years of court battles, a ruling was made by the tribunal. Surely somebody on the other side would have actually crunched the numbers to give the House a credible number of what that shortfall was.