I'm not really sure. I know that in terms of “A Guide to Green Government” years ago, they were calling in that document for an overarching plan. I think government departments over the intervening 10 to 12 years have from time to time called for that as well, and of course we're calling for it as well.
One of the reasons we're particularly keen to put that on the table just now is because I think there is.... I'm always very optimistic about the federal government being able to address a variety of these issues. There's a lot of goodwill within the government. There are a lot of very capable people. They want to get on with the task.
I felt it awkward to bring this status report to Parliament and to this committee with 14 new issues in it. People are going to say to me, well, wait a minute now, we have climate change, which is a huge issue, and now you're ladling on 14 more. Well, that's true, but it's not so much of a problem if you could sort of see where they fit into the government's overall plan.
Nobody is expecting--I'm sure you're not--all of this to be done at once. But I think it would be helpful for this committee, for Parliament, and for the Canadian people to understand that the federal government actually has a plan for all these issues, or many of them, and that they're going to be sequenced into operation in a reasonable way.
That's one of the reasons we got into calling for an overarching plan, and we believe in it strongly. As to why it hasn't been put in place, to me, it would just be good management practice. We're auditing the quality of management in the federal government; in this case, it's the environmental file. In that sense, I think it belongs, and it isn't there.