Thank you very much for that question, Chair.
We are concerned about very large transfers being made purportedly for certain purposes, but when you look at the actual agreements, there are absolutely no conditions requiring the recipient to use the moneys for the purposes being announced. We are actually currently doing some work, which I hope we will publish in the fall of 2008. It will be basically be an information piece about what the different transfers are, what the indicated purposes of these transfers are, and if there are in fact any conditions.
Some members might recall a few years ago there was a great deal of press coverage of money for a medical equipment fund and the criticism of some provinces that they were in fact using that money to buy lawnmowers. When you actually went to the agreement, even though it was announced as being destined for medical equipment, there was actually no condition that the province had to spend it on medical equipment. So the provinces were quite entitled to spend it on anything they wanted to spend it on.
So we believe there should perhaps be a little more truth in advertising, and we would like to do a piece for Parliament to inform Parliament about what are the major transfers to the provinces, are there in fact any conditions on them, and if there are conditions, does the government have any process in place to actually ensure those conditions are being met?
We would expect that piece to come within a year.