Thank you, Chair.
I want to focus on billable hours and the hourly rates with the civil agents.
Being Irish and a lawyer and a politician, I think I belong to the three groups that are still open for humour in this day and age. There is an old story about a lawyer who passed on and was at the Pearly Gates. St. Peter asked him how old he was, and he said he was 75 years of age. St. Peter looked at his book and said, “There must be some mistake. I have you down for 100 years on billable hours.”
If there's a weakness in government, it's that people are always spending other people's money. I practised law for 25 years, and you have to get into your client's wallet to get your money. It's a different parameter when you send the bill to somebody else to pay for your time and effort.
I guess what I'm really getting at is what kinds of controls or system you have in place to put some controls on the billable hours and the hourly rates that lawyers charge. I know lawyers would all like to charge $1,000 an hour if they could, but let's get real.