Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie. Is it incompetence or ignorance? I would say that it is a lack of leadership. That is a good answer, is it not? I strongly believe that it is a lack of leadership. I do not understand what happened because everyone knew what was going on. Everyone knew that the interim commissioner's term was scheduled to end on June 17. It is not true that the minister did not know. She was well aware of that fact. She found me quite tiresome last Wednesday when I reminded her not once, twice, or three times but four times that she should not forget that the interim commissioner's term was ending on Saturday, June 17. I also asked her what her plan was and what she intended to do.
Unfortunately, we are now in a situation where the government seems to have forgotten that the official languages commissioner is accountable not only to the government but to all of Parliament. When Madeleine Meilleur was appointed, the government forgot that it was supposed to consult the opposition leaders, namely, the leaders of the NDP and the Conservative Party. It says so in the Official Languages Act. Subsection 49(1) stipulates that, before an official languages commissioner can be appointed, the government must consult the opposition leaders. However, we learned in April that someone from the Department of Justice had called Ms. Meilleur.
There has been a lack of leadership in all this.