Procedure and House Affairs committee  Mr. Walsh, yes.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  What I said in my remarks is that I believe the government should submit a cost estimate with every bill before it gets to second reading and that the Parliamentary Budget Officer should have as one of his functions an evaluation of those cost estimates. That would, I believe, over time encourage the government to produce better cost estimates and would give you, through the Parliamentary Budget Officer's critique, a better way of critiquing them.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I believe that Parliament should take an initiative--and I would like to see it start with this committee--on defining what is a cabinet confidence and what isn't, because I believe that the present rules create a lot of the problems. The present rule is that what the government says is a cabinet confidence is treated as a cabinet confidence.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That was, I believe, what Mel Cappe said to you, wasn't it, among perhaps others?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's an immensely complicated thing, though. I'll give you an example. Last year and the year before, this House, this Parliament, passed budget implementation acts. In these were bills that in my view really were not implementing the budget but were separate things affecting environmental assessment.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  But let me just say one last thing here, sir, please. Really, we are in that situation, as I said earlier, of buying a pig in a poke when we pass legislation. We don't know what the cost estimates--

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Shall I answer that?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I'll give you a bit of background. I was a professor of political studies and I was also a professor of physical and health education. I often explain the answer to why both--it's not the true one, but I'll give it to you anyhow--is that politics is a contact sport. That's what you're involved in here at one level.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Sir, I detect a bit of partisanship in your question, but I will make an answer that I think governments of all stripes and bureaucracies of all stripes prefer to keep information to themselves than let it out, because it's power. Since the function of Parliament is ultimately based on having good information, I think there's always a tension between Parliament and government on this, and I would like to see the balance go more toward Parliament.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  What we see, I believe, in the statute governing the Parliamentary Budget Officer is a compromise between those who wanted an autonomous budget office similar to the Congressional Budget Office in the United States, those who didn't want anything, and those who were at other parts of the spectrum.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Good.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes. You're the Parliament for all of Canada; as far as I know, Canada includes provinces and territories, and Quebec is still, thank God, part of Canada. I think it's an artificial distinction to say that although we are legislating in a national Parliament, we're not going to pay attention to the costs to other jurisdictions.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Well, what the report could say is that you consider the information inadequate because it didn't include the costs for all Canadians and for all governments. If the federal government is going to do something and the federal Parliament is going to approve it, it should know the full stream of cost implications to all stakeholders, if you can use that expression, and if you don't get it, then certainly....

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Who knows what is going to happen out of this.