Public Accounts committee  I will really quickly—

Public Accounts committee  We do have a bit of work to do. You're right on that. We have a bit of work to do on small and medium businesses, and in other areas where we need to get some payments out that are not yet out. When they are, it will be completely revenue-neutral.

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, my answer to that is no, not necessarily. It would depend on.... It's very counterfactual. We're in the realm of the counterfactual here—how that money is profiled over time. It wouldn't necessarily particularly change the slope of the line on, say, deficit-to-GDP or the deficit numbers themselves.

Public Accounts committee  Well, again, I don't want to debate geometry here.

Public Accounts committee  What to say...? If that money were distributed differently, I think you could probably configure a line with a very similar slope. I'm not sure that the point the member is making about how booking it in a particular period was helpful to an argument about declining deficits to GDP.

Public Accounts committee  You can see those laid out, not in the public accounts, but in the recently tabled budget, actually in annex 1 on page 226. It lays out all of that. By way of short summary, we do see interest rates are expected to go up. As you know, the projections that we use in the budget are based on a survey of private sector economists and those private sector economists do assume that rates are going to go up.

Public Accounts committee  I'm sorry, Mr. Chair. I'm not sure I understand the question. I'm not trying to stall you here, I'm just trying—

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, I think the member is talking about a period of time that is beyond the period of time for which we would make projections. I'll back up and provide the following answer. Obviously, we're living in a period right now, with energy prices being what they are, when those inflows of revenues are substantially increasing our revenues and also the revenues of a number of provinces.

Public Accounts committee  There's no line item in the public accounts because what the member is pointing to is something that is prospective and in the future as opposed to retrospective. The public accounts, by their nature, are retrospective. However, there certainly is a substantial amount of work under way within the government, which was actually referenced in the recently tabled budget with respect to the work in particular that the Minister of Natural Resources, along with some of his colleagues, is going to be doing around that issue.

Public Accounts committee  There are two answers. By and large, yes, they do. There are some timing differences in how things are reported and how they are reflected in the public accounts. The public accounts treat this issue.... The accounting structure is that it's based on the period in which revenues are received and expenses are incurred, so when they are assessed or when they are disbursed.

Public Accounts committee  That is an ongoing process in the public accounts. The number is about $3.7 billion of overpayments. A lot of that, the majority of that, about $3 billion, is from the employment insurance system, and the emergency measures that were taken there. The remainder, about $700 million, is from the CERB.

Public Accounts committee  I don't know. Evelyn, do you?

Public Accounts committee  Mr. Chair, as I think is well known, according to an act of Parliament those payments have to be in balance and they have to be revenue-neutral.

Public Accounts committee  I don't have that number. We'll have to get back to you on that.

Public Accounts committee  It would be over and above.