The federal government deserves credit, since you mentioned the compliments, for having led the way to an integrated system of financial reporting that we now almost take for granted: the public accounts, the public sector accounting standards that exist and that the federal government adheres to along with the provinces and territories. It's a big step forward. Many other countries would love to have a framework that's as consistent as that.
One of the key elements of that framework is that it treats capital as something that you invest in, and it shows up as an asset on the balance sheet. Then, as it gets used up, you record the expense—its depreciation or amortization—and over time, as it gets used up completely, you run it down to zero, and all of that shows in the regular budget and the public accounts.
As assets get used up, they're shown as expenses. When they are first put in place, they do not show as expenses any more than a household would record buying a house as an expense. It's a very good framework. That's what the public accounts do and that's the main framework for accounting in the budget.
I have never thought that it made sense to have a separate capital framework, because then you're splitting the budget. It's like the bad old days and what many cities still do. You really want to have your operating and your capital budgets integrated, and that's what the federal public accounts do already.
We have a great framework. I don't think it adds a lot to start to count capital in a separate category, because it's all there in the public accounts. It's a very good system for keeping track of how all your physical assets are and what needs running down.
With the federal government investing so much more in capital assets, including in defence over the next little while, I think we should pay attention to that overall bottom line rather than starting to separate the budget and have more than one bottom line.