Actually, there is a museum policy right now, but in our opinion it needs to be updated very significantly.
I'll give you just a little bit of history.
In 1972 the first national museum policy was brought in when the Honourable Gérard Pelletier was the Secretary of State, and then the Honourable Marcel Masse in the Mulroney government updated and renewed and expanded the policy. However, over the last few years there has been some erosion in funding and generally in the effectiveness of the policy.
I'm going to seize upon some of the words that Pierre Landry used. He talked about 2017 as an opportunity to “right the ship”, and this would be one of the areas we believe need to be reviewed and investigated and one for which a more comprehensive policy needs to be developed.
Right now, frankly, we're just pleased to hold on to what we have in terms of funding, and in fact to see some improvements that have come out of the federal budget. So I think we've actually done quite well in the federal budget, but as we look forward there are still many unanswered questions. There are the needs Ms. Evenden referred to in terms of collections, and the proper preservation and facilities that need to be built upon, and these do need serious attention.