National Defence committee  The aboriginal litigation...as you know, for both the barracks site and the Winnipeg South housing site--the decision covered both--we had hoped that we would be able to negotiate with the aboriginal groups to get agreement notwithstanding the litigation. That didn't happen. With the decision on the duty to consult, we're just going to have to see how we proceed in fact.

National Defence committee  This has been an ongoing issue for us from the last time we were here. Let me say we recognize the frustration. We're looking at the court's decision. We will try to develop a course of action that addresses the competing interest and the legal requirement. I wish I could be more helpful than that under the circumstances, Mr.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, on the issue of equipment acquisition, the rhythm we follow is essentially lined up over a long period of time, based on when the equipment that's being replaced actually needs to be replaced. There is a very long lead time required for these discussions, negotiations, and acquisitions, so that when we get into the replacement of frigates, for example, we still have many years left on the life of the frigates, but we will start the process.

National Defence committee  That's a very complex set of questions. I have to go back to the Auditor General's report to see whether in fact she said “inadequate”. This is a very large, very complicated department. The reality is that the organization, on the financial side, is planned extremely well. It tends to be, and it has traditionally been, more of a bottom-up planning exercise than a top-down strategically driven exercise, for a whole variety of reasons that go back into the 1980s and the 1990s.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. On the question of whether the air force has too much funding, that's a trick question. I'll deal with accrual accounting. As we went through the Canada First defence strategy on the modernization of all of the major fleets, I think the general view was that the army, navy, and air force came out exactly where they needed to come out after a very strong and tough internal discussion, and then a discussion that we had, obviously, with our political masters over a number of months.

National Defence committee  All I can say is we have the court decision and we are reviewing it. The court will determine the next steps. The decision did say that the duty to consult had not been satisfied, so we are trying to work our way through that.

National Defence committee  Mr. Chairman, I will start with Mr. Pentney on the issue of section 38.

Public Accounts committee  Yes, absolutely.

Public Accounts committee  Since I've been in this organization I've been struck that this is a complex business. We will never be perfect, but we will strive for perfection. Our intent is to obviously and very seriously get better on an ongoing basis. We welcome the Auditor General's report. We certainly welcome the committee's interest.

Public Accounts committee  I'm not totally certainly I understand what you mean by “crisis”. The government's commitment to the department is that in addition to the funding envelope of the Canada first defence strategy, they will fund deployed operations incremental to the actual budget line that's in the Canada first defence strategy.

Public Accounts committee  The interim milestones that are actually laid out in our action plan have approval of our corporate risk profile and defence priorities by February 2010, and level one business plan decisions risk-informed in March 2010, and then we move forward from there. Integrated risk management, as I said earlier, is extremely complex.

Public Accounts committee  It's probably not exactly the perfect term to have used. I can't remember exactly which budget it was, budget 2006 or budget 2005, in which the government announced that it was going to seek procurement savings from the procurement process as a result of different behaviours by Public Works, on the order of $1 billion, ramping up to about $1 billion per year.

Public Accounts committee  On the operational side, absolutely, on the human life piece.

Public Accounts committee  I'll the ask the CFO or the vice to speak to the kind of corporate over-planning targets, but it clearly is an important in-year strategic tool for us in terms of how we manage. But Vice, or CFO, Kevin, one of the two of you, would you like to speak to the over-programming allocation on that?

Public Accounts committee  Yes, since Korea.