We have had discussions with the government on that issue in particular. We're adamant about being involved in the process because of all the work we've done to date in developing the benchmark regime, which Mr. Gagnon has developed, and subsequently in our starting discussions with provincial governments as well.
We want the best regulations possible. We want the best standards for our people in the community to ensure that they get what they deserve, basically, and that's our goal as communities: working on behalf of our communities. As well, I think that in terms of the resourcing of this, it's like I spoke about yesterday. Our goal is to get the best and most accurate information so that we ourselves, individually as communities and collectively as communities, will know what it's going to cost, based on relevant, reliable data.
A lot of the work we've been doing over these years has been about creating volumes and volumes of data about our communities in terms of having a greater understanding of the systems that are operating in the communities, then compiling all that information about anything and everything that's in the communities, feeding it back to the communities, and working with the communities in terms of extrapolating a cost for communities. We're then aggregating that cost for what we're looking at, both in terms of the long-term capital cost and also in trying to come up with a very accurate cost for the operation and maintenance, and not just for now. We're trying to look out into the future for 10 years, 20 years, and 30 years out.
I've always said when we've come to talk about water and the bill that this is a public safety issue in our communities, and we have to take it seriously, as we must, and ensure that our effort as an organization is to create the most accurate and relevant information, where the government has to see it for what it is, basically, and recognize that. I think that's fundamentally important, because we have to explain this same data to our communities as well. I spoke earlier about this. That's why raising awareness and understanding and communicating about what we're doing and how we're doing it with our communities are fundamentally important in trying to come up with a solution that makes sense.
I'm hopeful that the government will live up to its commitment that says we will be directly involved in what gets developed in terms of a regulatory regime. We're adamant about that. We're going to have to wait and see exactly what happens, but I can tell you that we're not going anywhere. We've been at this for six years, and we're going to get this to where we want to get it for our communities and for our leaders.