Mr. Chairman, we have been listening to the President of the Treasury Board saying over and over again that it is necessary to designate the 600 or 700 CX people who are left over.
However, as recently as March 22, the Treasury Board and the Public Service Alliance of Canada signed a memorandum of settlement saying that it was understood and agreed that the 608 positions identified were not designated within the meaning, et cetera. Item No. 3 said that the parties further agreed that the employer would not seek any change of the non-designated status of the positions until subsequent notice to bargain was served in the next round of bargaining, et cetera.
The treasury board and the Public Service Alliance met all day on March 19 to hash out the agreement that they would not do anything to go after these non-designated people, and now we are facing legislation, the heaviest hand of all, being imposed in the House of Commons. I guess I am asking for some explanation.
If the memorandum signed on March 22 said that we could survive with this number of non-designated people, why is it now an emergency and all of them have to be designated immediately with such a heavy instrument or a blunt cudgel, one might say?