Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I would like to thank all of you, all the departmental officials from Public Works, Treasury Board, and Human Resources for coming out today.
You can understand why it's important for us to meet today. On September 25, the budget cuts were announced by Treasury Board Secretariat. We met with the minister on October 17, and some of you accompanied the minister from Treasury Board. As you can imagine, we weren't entirely impressed with some of the responses because of the partisan nature to the dialogue that took place. In light of that, we want to understand the policy behind the decisions he made.
Today's purpose is very different for me and, I believe, for many of my colleagues here today. It's to really focus on the process of how things unfolded. That's where I will be putting my attention, not on the ideology behind the cuts, because I think that was clearly discussed last time. It's something that has been discussed in the public domain as well.
I want to make a small comment to the deputy minister for the Department of Human Resources. I do appreciate the opening remarks, but you mentioned quite a few numbers. If we had something in writing before, it would have really been useful. On a going-forward basis, that would be greatly appreciated.
Before I get into the process, my initial question is about value for money. The government has clearly indicated that there are certain programs that are not considered to have value for money. I think they estimated that to be around $265 million. Could you describe what in your various departments is considered not to be value for money? According to the initial remarks given by the human resources department, there was a long list of items: cutting money for literacy and youth employment and targeting that money, cutting the status of women programs, and other programs that were cut as well. I just want to understand, of those cuts, which ones are perceived to not be value for money?
Answer that question, please.