Right. Fair point. But I think it would also be fair to acknowledge that there's nothing the federal government can do to force a provincial professional agency to recognize anyone's credentials.
I would also suggest that at the provincial level, the mark of success isn't necessarily whether more people are getting credentials recognized but whether they're getting decisions, and reasonable decisions, in a faster period of time. We can't say to the Ontario professional engineers association that every person who applies ought to be recognized; we can say that those people ought to have a decision rendered faster and in accordance with a transparent process.
I'd like to commend some of the provincial governments, including the Ontario government, for taking this matter much more seriously. Ontario has set up the fairness commission, chaired by our former colleague, Ms. Augustine. I gather she's begun the process of auditing the conduct of those professional agencies in Ontario. The B.C. government has taken important steps as well.
What we're doing is we're working with the provinces, trying to get them, frankly, to bring the professional agencies to the table and to get with the program, to ensure that the door is not arbitrarily closed to newcomers who are seeking credential recognition.