Yes.
We considered the backlog to be unacceptable. My predecessor came up with a common-sense plan to address that backlog.
To recap, the plan was for officials at the department to triage the outstanding cases that were awaiting appeal to the general and appeal divisions and to settle as many as humanly possible so that they did not have to go before the tribunal at all. I am happy to report that the department has done an exceptional job in this practice. They are settling cases at a very rapid rate.
The team that some in the media have called the spike unit—I'm not sure that's the proper technical term—has done an extraordinary job serving Canadians and resolving as many of these outstanding cases as possible. I'm happy to report that they will have done all of the triage work on those cases by about mid-August, which was the original plan. Of course, there are some cases that we can't settle because our officials deem them to be not appropriate for settlement, and they do need to be put before the tribunal for deliberation. But I can tell you that the department's work is going extremely well and it will be completed on schedule.