Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome to the committee, and congratulations.
I think the term used is simply an expression associated with a person who is not employed, in the legal sense, who has no fixed term. So I think that this expression...
It has no particular reference to you or to your job duties. It's one that's common throughout the civil service.
I want to state at the outset that I have absolutely no doubt that someone of your experience and background will be what might be called a “lifelong learner”, and be quite capable of adapting to new information and a new department.
I am also going to say at the outset that I'm quite happy you have an economic background. When I looked at your résumé, at first I wondered about it, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that all of the important questions I have on the environmental file involve economics. The only way we can proceed with environmental initiatives is by tailoring them to our economic circumstances. So I think you are, quite frankly, the right man for this job at this time.
My area of interest has to do less with some of the policy issues that we've heard here today and more with the management side of things. It's been nibbled at around the edges by a few of the questions.
Can you tell me whether or not the job description for the position you're filling now, as assistant to the deputy minister, will require you to interface with the whole environment department team, as it were, and to act in a managerial capacity with that team?
Also, how does it compare with the managerial side of what you had done previously as associate secretary for the Treasury Board? For example, I don't know how many people you might have been responsible to manage, or, as the assistant deputy minister in charge of the tax policy branch, how large a team you had, or how many sections.
Can you give me some sense of how your current managerial responsibilities grow out of or expand upon your previous managerial experience in those positions?
Merci beaucoup.