Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has made it quite clear that the employee involved resigned.
Until an investigation could be completed that person was without employment for some seven and a half months, which means that the $31,000 covered only the first three and a half months. There was a considerable period of time when that person was not employed and yet that person had not done anything wrong, as the minister clearly said.
The government is dedicated to ensuring the cost efficiency of every taxpayers' dollar that comes into the revenues of the government. We are tightening up on many of these procedures which previous governments had put in place to make sure that happens.