Government Operations committee  Not even a commitment.

Government Operations committee  This is off the top of my head. And, Martha, I'm going to have to rely on you to come up with this, as I don't know if I can remember completely. The definition of a liability is where you know that a future economic benefit is going to be lost and you have no ability to be abl

Government Operations committee  Almost. It's not quite legal, because I think a constructive liability would fall under that, but where the person who has made the promise cannot get out of it.

Government Operations committee  It's a tough definition.

Government Operations committee  But that's what we need for financial statements; otherwise people will say, I have a liability here, there, and everywhere, and before you know it you have no rules. Madam Chair, if you will excuse me, I will leave you in the capable hands of my colleague.

Government Operations committee  I think that is going to be the mind change that needs to take place, because all the time the belief is that you need to have an envelope system that gives you the spending authority for that cash for the next year and the warrants for times when you don't have that spending aut

Government Operations committee  B.C. has--

Government Operations committee  A practical way of doing it.

Government Operations committee  My apologies.

Government Operations committee  The Public Sector Accounting Board currently has a particular project that's trying to look at infrastructure assets. But primarily it's going to affect local governments more than anything else. It's the roads, the sewers, and the difficulty there is the so-called infrastructure

Government Operations committee  Don't get me wrong, I don't hold with putting a liability on the books either. Today it might be the infrastructure deficit. Why wouldn't somebody down the road come up and say there's an education deficit, we have a liability, we have to put it up there? Or some other deficit so

Government Operations committee  I'll try, because I'm not familiar--or as familiar as you, for sure--with it. You actually do it, so you must be comfortable with what you're doing. The way I would respond is that one of the other things we're doing in the public sector accounting board is looking at how to bet

Government Operations committee  Yes.

Government Operations committee  That's a real beauty, and we haven't been able to crack it. We don't have the same problem as the European countries. Our heritage assets are very young compared to those in Europe—the Coliseum or whatever the items are—and they haven't cracked it either. I think it illustrate

Government Operations committee  The saving on those costs?