Thanks very much to you, Madame Legault, and to you, Madame Michaud, for being here this afternoon.
These are outstanding reports, I must say. It gives us a real idea of the impact of these budget freezes on your department.
I'd also like to congratulate you for being nominated, finally, as Information Commissioner. I fully support your nomination. I hope that will come to a positive conclusion very, very shortly and the appointment comes very quickly.
I want to compliment you as well on the exemplary work you've done over the last year. I've thought that what you've been able to achieve over the last year has been outstanding, especially with the pressures you've had on your budget. I, for one, would love to see your budget increased; I think it's important, and it should go hand in hand with your appointment, to be quite frank.
I think it also points out, as you've been able to summarize today in your opening remarks, the impacts of this across-the-board budget freeze to you and your department and, through you and your department, to Canadians. If you could close some 400 more cases a year, we'd certainly appreciate that, so I'm fully supportive of you actually receiving an increase in your particular allotment, because I think it's important to Canadians.
Having said that, I note that one of the things you did mention in your report was that historically when cuts are to internal services, one of the pressures that may be found, of course, and for you, acting as an ombudsman, is that the whole of access to information may suffer, and we're already having a lot of challenges. I reflect back, for example, on your recent report, Out of Time, which states that “the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, in collaboration with relevant institutions and agencies, develop and implement, as a matter of urgency” a plan to address the current shortage.
You went on to talk about how “the risks from inadequate funding are abundant”. I looked down your list of report cards that give Natural Resources Canada an F, Canadian Heritage an F, CIDA an F, and so on, and some even...for example, DFAIT got a red alert. When you talk about that, you must be concerned about the budget freeze and its impacts on these particular departments in these particular cases.
Can you just talk a little bit about that? And how can we work with government departments to prioritize, to assure that funding is allocated to ensure this is done?