Human Resources committee  I'm not here to speak to the appointments process, and it wouldn't be within my purview to do that. I would just highlight, though, that the board of referees is a layperson panel, whereas the umpires are an arm's-length judicial tribunal of people who are former judges from the

Human Resources committee  They are former judges of the different levels of court--county, provincial, or federal.

Human Resources committee  Generally they are.

Human Resources committee  We have fairly generous provisions that allow a hearing to be delayed if there are circumstances there. Éric, do you want to speak to any of the specific circumstances around which a hearing would be delayed?

Human Resources committee  We have the hearings scheduled in the board centres for a number of reasons. There is definitely a cost factor, but there is also a privacy factor. This is confidential client information, and there are system requirements to protect that information. It's a secure facility that

Human Resources committee  They're appointed by the chief umpire.

Human Resources committee  It's done in consultation with the chief judge of the Federal Court.

Human Resources committee  Do you want to clarify that?

Human Resources committee  It's more in the realm of judicial appointments, and outside the purview of--

Human Resources committee  That's not a performance measure that we track, since this is an arm's-length judicial body that is hearing these cases. We're informed that 12 months is the average length of time, but I'm not in a position to comment on--

Human Resources committee  It's around 1,500.

Human Resources committee  That's how many are submitted to the umpire. There may be....

Human Resources committee  We are not responsible for that. The umpire, as I said, is an arm's-length organization that reports on its.... We don't have that.

Human Resources committee  There is some information on the volume of appeals in the monitoring and assessment report, which, as I said, will be coming out in the coming weeks.

Human Resources committee  The information for 2008-2009 is in the current monitoring and assessment report. The information for the following year will be in the forthcoming monitoring and assessment report on volumes of appeals to the umpire.