Government Operations committee  Thank you for the question. To your point about 50,000 buildings, again, for members, about 350-odd buildings are in the Public Works portfolio; if I remember, it's 315 buildings. This is what we own. They're office buildings. But you're right, there are a lot of federal buildings above and beyond what we call office buildings.

Government Operations committee  There are a lot of them. I agree with you. The things I'm directly responsible for are the office buildings. Having said that, I'm not aware of the status of that program. That program, if I remember, was put in place by NRCan. The other point I would say that goes to your point is this.

Government Operations committee  We do have projects like Place du Portage. I'm not necessarily aware of the timing for that building. I'm thinking of the C.D. Howe Building and Place de Ville. We are going to be making investments in these buildings.

Government Operations committee  On Larco, or the sale-leaseback of the seven buildings, when those buildings were sold, we had very good timing, and we see that now. That is the first point I will make. We did indeed sell buildings that had good value, otherwise there would have been no pickup. That's the second point I would make, and I don't question that.

Government Operations committee  I thank you for the question. I don't want to be too long on this, because it can get technical, but in our asset facility management plan, we have a process whereby we establish priorities. You're not going to be surprised that our top priorities are health and safety, and then we go down the list.

Government Operations committee  Sorry.

Government Operations committee  Thank you for the question. I'll be brief. I know you want me to be brief, but I just want to say a few things before, if you don't mind, and I'll answer the question very clearly. Members, Madam Chair, when we're given a mandate on the precinct, we do pretty well. With a clear mandate, plus the money, and we're just left to operate....

Government Operations committee  If you will allow me, I will give you a few figures that speak for themselves. I just want to put things in perspective. The total amount, for the two years, is $431 million. The first year, this year, we invested $227 million. We were able to use about 96% of the figure planned—we are in the process of finalizing the figures, which is to be expected.

Government Operations committee  No.

Government Operations committee  Yes. I might not do it myself, it might be done by the members of a group called the Departmental Oversight Branch. That is a branch that is unique to our Department. Unless I am mistaken, we are the only ones to have one of them. The people in that group are the ones who do the work.

Government Operations committee  No, I do not communicate directly with those people. When there is a dispute, if we decide to make representations, it's the people in legal services who handle it. They may be asked to work with the people at the CITT.

Government Operations committee  Absolutely, to make our representations. In some cases, we win; in others, we lose. Either way, it involves making contacts.

Government Operations committee  On the first question, I think the contract does what it is supposed to do and that works well. I know there are some problems. It would be a little naive to ignore that. Comments have been made on certain work. Access to information was in issue. However, if we set those items aside and consider things with a very structured approach, by doing an audit, we see that those people have done a good job and savings have been achieved.

Government Operations committee  If I may, Madam Chair, I'm going to go back to one point, briefly. We say there is no contact when a contract is to be issued, but during the process, there may be an Industry Day. That is part of a transparent process in which the companies introduce themselves, depending on the contract we are preparing to offer.

Government Operations committee  When the competitive processes are prepared, when it involves an acquisition strategy, criteria, the team responsible for selecting or evaluating criteria, I am not even involved in those decisions. That is done at the program level. So there is some distance established, and I think that is very sound.