Finance committee  Yes, we do. There are projections in the budget through 2014-15. Elderly benefits, we project, will be $45.2 billion in 2014-15.

Finance committee  The gas tax is the one main transfer that in the budget we consider transferred to other levels of government, but that in the main estimates you'll find in the departmental tables.

Finance committee  Correct--

Finance committee  Yes, there's some.... The debt charges that are reflected here, which I believe are $33.7 billion, are reflective of the projection for debt charges in the September 2009 fall statement. As you know, between September 2009 and the budget, interest rates fell a lot. As a result, in the budget we're projecting debt charges of $31.3 billion for 2010-11, so a savings of about—

Finance committee  What we're comparing here is the $33.8 billion in debt charges for the 2010-11 fiscal year, which was tabled March 3 before the budget, and that forecast was based not on the budget forecast but on the forecast available previous to the budget, which was the fall update. What I'm saying is between the fall update and the budget—

Finance committee  No. What I'm saying is that the main estimates, which are not the budget but the main estimates and they are tabled before the budget, were based on the fall update, because the budget had not been presented. We have come out with our supplementary estimates (A) and we revised the debt charge number down to $31.3 billion.

Finance committee  For 2009-10, the accumulated debt is $517.5 billion.

Finance committee  Up from $463.7 billion in 2008-09.

Finance committee  Today, the fixed proportion is around 62%.

Finance committee  I think we have someone from PPP Canada coming to the table.

Finance committee  In our case, as you know, most of our budget is statutory, related to things like transfers and debt charges. Transfers we expect to be largely unchanged. Debt charges, however, will be significantly lower. So if one were to look at the aggregate Finance estimate, I think it would come in lower simply because interest rates are lower.

Finance committee  Could you let us know what you're referring to, what line you're referring to? Softwood lumber?

Finance committee  The Auditor General's budget, as I understand it, is determined by a procedure through the public accounts committee. The Auditor General reports through the Minister of Finance for the purposes of tabling, but we don't have direct input over her budget. As the 2010 budget set out, the government is asking all agencies to abide by and follow the expenditure restraint measures that were set out in the budget.

Government Operations committee  I would agree with the general proposition that the focus of the government should be to ensure that amounts are spent as planned and that they're spent effectively and appropriately. We can have a debate on jobs created and on the various sources of information one should use to calculate that.

Government Operations committee  To answer your questions, a big part of the government's plan to wind down the deficit is to ensure that the plan is temporary and winds down as planned. Just doing that reduces the deficit from $56 billion to something like $27 billion.