Thank you.
Back to the question of the backlog, I notice that refugee spending is actually $10 million less. The planned spending was $85.5 million; it's now $75.4 million. And the claims waiting for decision have dramatically increased; it's 38% more than a year before. So you now have 42,000 claims according to your performance report, 42,000 refugee claimants waiting for a long time, some over a year, two years—a third of them have to wait over a year. Yet in terms of number of staff, you've dropped your staff from 1,000 to 928; it's 97 fewer staff members than the year before. So you have less staff. The cost per claim has gone up from $2,491 to $4,938 within three years. So the cost per claim has gone up dramatically. The claims waiting for a decision have gone up 38%. You're spending less. You have less staff, 97 fewer staff members. That doesn't make sense, because isn't the goal to shorten the wait list for these refugee claimants? Whether you agree or don't agree, they shouldn't be waiting for a long period of time. Your department is actually going in the wrong direction, and if you look at the chart, it just keeps going up—the wait list, claimants waiting. The chart has been going up and up. I looked at the chart and it didn't make sense, and in the meantime the costs have gone up.
So there's something really wrong there. And putting aside refugees, the Immigration Appeal Board is not doing much better. The number of appeals waiting for a decision has also increased by 9,600, and again the wait times have gone up. So I can imagine an overseas husband and wife waiting to come in—they were turned down, they appealed, 39% of them are over a year. That's a long wait for an appeal, probably two years now. That wife might have a baby overseas by now, right, so they're separated for two years. So this doesn't look right and doesn't seem right, and it's not as if you don't have the money. You're just not spending it.