Thank you for the question, Mr. Chair, and I am grateful for it.
Maybe what I'll do is take a step back. I believe it was in February 2011 that Canada and the United States announced they were going to work together to establish a new long-term partnership to accelerate the legitimate flow of people and goods between both countries, while strengthening security and economic competitiveness. The plan for that was crystallized later on that year, in December 2011.
When we talk about the border, the border is a complicated place. We have people going back and forth for business and for pleasure and leisure all the time. Both governments are interested in finding ways to facilitate legitimate trade and the legitimate flow of business. Each country is driven by its own unique considerations, one of which is security.
The plan was quite a complicated one, and it involved on both sides of the border a multi-departmental approach to implementing it, including the modernization of complicated IT systems.
The work has been ongoing since late 2011. That work has been housed in Canada at the Privy Council Office because of our unique bird's-eye perspective and our ability to pull together all of the departments. It has come along well and has matured. We are seeking funding in these estimates and going over two years. We'll be in a position over the next year to synchronize the review of the work done to figure out a way forward.