In the administrative policies of government, if we go back, previously the officers of Parliament were included with all the other departments and agencies. The administrative policies all applied to us with no recognition of the independence that was needed for officers of Parliament in the management of their offices.
We began discussions with the Treasury Board Secretariat about this, and we said there were some provisions that were really inappropriate and that didn't recognize the independence that was required. The secretariat was actually very cooperative and worked very diligently with us. A large number of policies were changed on things like requiring approval of ministers or approval, for example, of central agencies on contracting and communications.
I'm sure the member might recall that we appeared before the public accounts committee on the question of the communications policy and that technically all of the news releases of the Auditor General had to be approved by the Privy Council Office. Well, that wasn't going to happen. They had never asked us for it, but that was what the administrative policy was. We worked through all that, and all of those policies were amended. It is very clear now in the contracting policy that the agents of Parliament do not have to have Treasury Board approval.