Mr. Speaker, first of all, as I said, there has been a loss of expertise within the government. It has been shifted to external consultants. Perhaps the government should have listened more closely to the public servants who raised concerns about the Phoenix system. It is clear that their comments were not taken into account.
I would also like to address the fact that the government tried to downplay the situation. There was talk of 85,000 cases. Initially, that was not what the minister told the House, and it took a few weeks before we got the truth. We finally managed to obtain this information about the 85,000 cases in committee. We were told that it was zero point something per cent. At first, the Liberals downplayed it and refused to answer questions during question period. It took some hard work in committee, which is why I want to acknowledge the efforts of my colleague, who succeeded in getting his committee to call for this independent public inquiry.
That is what we are debating today in the hope of shedding light on all this.