That's good to hear.
I have to tell you, this is not anything new. We've had it with previous governments. The appointments process is always a problem. There always tend to be bottlenecks, and you know—full confession—I can go back to when I was in provincial government and we had the same problem. We always seemed to be behind, and it always has such a major impact. At the centre, where these decisions are made, it ranks very low in terms of crisis problems, but in terms of the problems it manifests, it's huge. I don't know what the answer is, other than to keep underscoring it through reports like this, and politically underscoring it and holding the government to account in question period as to why these things aren't happening.
When I first opened this, I thought, oh, it's CMHC—this is going to be going down the rabbit hole. This is going to get ugly, because there are so many moving parts and each piece needs to be analyzed so carefully. If there are problems anywhere, my experience is that a lot of it is due to lack of planning, lack of analysis and lack of risk assessment, which are all the areas you've done a pretty darn good job on.
My opening—and I don't say this lightly, as people know—is that, in the main, given the responsibilities, the number of moving parts that you have to be responsible for and the in-depth thinking that needs to happen, I was fairly impressed with how well the operation has run. I really appreciate the questions of my colleagues, who have a much deeper background in these things. That's why it's good to have a good mix on the public accounts committee, so that we can all bring different perspectives.
I'm curious. I noted with interest what it said on page 8 in paragraph 23 on board appointments. It struck me. It said:
Further, anyone appointed as a director or president is required to divest themselves of any shares of lending institutions within three months of their appointment. These restrictions constrain appointments to the Board by limiting the pool of eligible candidates.
That's pretty big. Senators don't even have to do that, but we won't go there, will we?
How much does a board member make?