Finance committee  Thank you. You can certainly see the statistics as to whether or not that is going to imply that there has been any sort of charter breach. That would be an argument that a lawyer would need to construct. But I must repeat that it's certainly our obligation, and one that we take

Finance committee  The amendments contain some transition provisions that deal with applicants both pre- and post-February 27. For those who are in the backlog, that is the pre-February 27 backlog, the minister's obligation and undertaking is to bring that number down as quickly as possible, becaus

Finance committee  We're obliged to process all applications.

Finance committee  I don't, and I don't recall referring to ethnic or national origin. I was referring to the resources at certain of our missions.

Finance committee  We have national and regional information, but we do not have ethnic breakdowns.

Finance committee  We can certainly get you that information. Some of it is available on our website. Some is available in the levels plan. We can certainly provide the committee with that.

Finance committee  We have the distinction, I think, of being one of the most highly litigated departments in the government, so I think if there were to be any suggestion, then there would certainly be challenges brought to bear.

Finance committee  I'm sorry, I just don't have that number.

Finance committee  Well, I can tell you some of the factors involved in this. We have 90 missions across the globe dealing with these sorts of issues. We have about 1,500 officers. Processing times are going to vary from mission to mission. There are costs associated with processing times. There ar

Finance committee  --because some people may have security concerns that cause further investigations.

Finance committee  So there is certainly a range of factors that one would have to take into account. I regret I don't have more specific numbers for you.

Finance committee  The levels exercise that we have, and have had, has been founded on a number of factors. One would be the overall departmental budget, which I think is $1.4 billion, or something in that ballpark. That is one of the myriad factors that allows us to establish what those levels are

Finance committee  We do indeed. Just to give you an example, posting people abroad is a fairly expensive undertaking. As I mentioned, we have some 1,500 people abroad, including Canada-based and locally engaged staff. It is, indeed, a fairly expensive undertaking.

Finance committee  As I mentioned in response to one of the other questions, one of the important considerations that we will need to take into account as we develop the instructions is our range of obligations and commitments internationally and domestically. Domestically, we have the Immigratio

Finance committee  While I certainly agree with you that the 925,000 is a problem, I don't know that I would necessarily agree with your depiction of officials' work on it. But it is an issue that we need to address, because as I mentioned earlier, and I think as the minister pointed out, it is hav