Transport committee  In retrospect, we can look back at that and we can acknowledge that it was an aspect of the original certification that was not done properly. As a validating authority, we got the information that we got and we based our decision on the information that was available at the time.

Transport committee  I'll take that question.

Transport committee  I would say that a harmonized approach to findings of compliance is critical to the industry. If each individual authority took a different interpretation of the same rule, the applicant, the manufacturer, would end up having to effectively recertify the aircraft every time someone asked a different question.

Transport committee  However, the question remains valid. As Mr. Robinson explained, our process of raising papers throughout the validation process is aimed at seeking an understanding of how the certifying authority drew their conclusions. Particularly in this case, the question, and it was only a question, was to confirm and to understand a methodology that Boeing had been using to achieve compliance to a basic stall requirement, I'll call it part 25, paragraph 201.

Transport committee  The answer is yes. Just for the record, my records indicate that it's concern paper C-FT-03. You might be mistaken there, just so we don't get fouled up with the record.

Transport committee  I would just like to add that—

Transport committee  I think we need to understand that the regulations and standards that we use to certify aircraft.... There are very many of them; they're very complex and in many cases they're very subjective. It is very common for a validating authority to come along and ask a question. We dig into an issue, we get an answer and we don't quite understand it.

Transport committee  That is how we migrate to a harmonized position.

Transport committee  Well, I'm the one who signs off on those, respectively, Mr. Doherty—

Transport committee  —and I can tell you where we're coming from.

Transport committee  No, we did not. Perhaps it would help if I re-explained what Minister Garneau has already explained with respect to the process with the concern paper. First off, this concern paper that you refer to did not specifically raise a technical or safety issue. It did not. It asked a question.

Transport committee  Thank you for the question. Personally, no, I don't. In fact, the mandate of that activity is in the process of being rewritten. It so happens that this particular mandate was written at a particular point in time. I was not present at that meeting.

Transport committee  It was signed, but I'm telling you here and now that the wording of it was planned to be altered prior to these accidents.

Transport committee  Not yet.

Transport committee  It's still in the process of being revised. We meet annually with the FAA. It's on the agenda for our next meeting.