Fundamentally, what's going on here is a case of justice delayed is justice denied. My understanding is that there's already a one-and-a-half-year wait for one of these appeal cases to go through the system. It can be easily anticipated that, with a 40% reduction in staff, that wait period is going to extend beyond that one and a half years. In fact, I think Mr. El-Daher, who testified earlier this week, estimated that it would go from one to three years to up to five years now. That's just outrageous. A criminal in this country has the right to a trial in 18 months, but the people who defend us can wait for years to get their appropriate benefits.
