I don't know all the history of the cabinet directive, but when you think about the tools you can use to look at environmental impacts, the two big tools you have are the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, which looks at projects on the ground, such as a new mine or a new railway, and examines the environmental impacts. But there's a whole bunch of other things we do, such as decisions, programs, policies, and plans. Also, do we look at the federal budget every year from an environmental perspective? I know for sure that we look at it from an economic and from a social perspective, but where's the environmental assessment of the budget, as an example of a big policy decision that we make?
The strategic environmental assessment tool was to try to grasp and help us look at all three pieces of information—economic, social, and environmental—when we're making policy decisions that have big impacts. You do it for projects on the ground, for things you can physically look at, such as impact on fish, water, air, people, and all that stuff. What about all the policies and plans? That was the idea behind the tool of strategic environmental assessment.