Thank you very much, and thank you, Minister.
I want to set the stage by saying that supplementary estimates are based on performance reports. I guess in health and health care, performance is very important. In terms of results-based management, in the foreword from the Treasury Board, we need to know whether we're winning with all the money that's being spent.
I guess I'm a bit disappointed that the performance report for Health Canada, and for all of the agencies, doesn't actually explain the results in a way we would expect, in terms of what is happening, whether it's wait times, whether it's HIV rates, or whether it's any of the things that matter to us.
I'm disappointed also, Minister, that the first report of the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada has not been tabled. I don't think it's good enough any longer to separate these two things, in terms of the money we're spending and the results we're getting in the health and health care of Canadians.
That being said, in the Public Health Agency performance report, there is a paragraph on page 34 that says:
There has been a steep increase in sexually transmitted infections over the last decade, and rising co-infections of HIV with diseases such as tuberculosis, hepatitis C and syphilis.
I guess we're admitting there that we're losing in terms of results—there's an increase in this—and yet there seems to be a decrease in the amount you're spending in community-based programs for prevention and whatever.
Certainly, we know there are 4,500 new cases of HIV/AIDS in Canada every year; this has plateaued. I guess I don't understand, the rumour being that in the rolling budgets of your department, Ontario has had the highest number of HIV-positive test reports in the country. In 2005, there were 1,670 HIV-positive tests; this is an increase from 2003-04. So I simply don't understand how we can be cutting Ontario disproportionately in community-based funding.
I know there's been an interest in the HIV vaccine. I know that the Gates Foundation is giving you some money. So my first question would be, how much money are you putting into the Canadian HIV initiative overall? How much every year? What is the source of that funding? Will those funds be additional to the $84.4 million that was promised through the federal initiative to address it? If not, how much is being taken out of that $84.4 million, and is that where you are achieving the necessity of these cuts to community-based programs, which actually are about prevention and the human response in supports and services to people with AIDS in our country?