Thank you, Chair. Yes, I will be splitting my time with Mr. Tabbara.
Thank you, Minister, and thanks a lot for all the work you're doing on this important file. This topic that we are starting is very important to all of us, I think, and for me it is really very important. In the riding I represent, family reunification is a very big issue, and 90% of the casework in my office is related to immigration.
Minister, when you were here before our committee on June 9 to discuss the 2016 levels and the supplementary estimates, you discussed an adjustment to operating expenditures of $20.9 million to hire 191 full-time equivalents to support reducing existing family class inventories, increasing family class intake, and streamlining processing, among other activities. Have those people been hired? What impact have they made on the backlog?