Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We reorder the list.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There's some debate about that in the public accounts committee, which I think you may be alluding to. My understanding is that it essentially codifies the principles and practices we're always under. It makes it very clear that there's a zone the minister is responsible for in

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes. As I said, it actually has made it very clear what I have to answer for: I have to answer for the statement of internal control of the department; I have to sign the financial statements; if there are glitches or boo-boos in the financial presentation, I'm the one you should

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  No, that would have predated the whole settlement. In the 2006 budget, the government built the settlement from the Iacobucci process into the fiscal framework.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The claim settlements that were reached in 2005-06 are captured in there. If you were to take the picture again a year later you'd get a slightly different mix. If you were to take the picture again in 2007-08 you'd get a slightly different mix. But the portrait is more or less a

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  These sorts of accounting issues are a little difficult. The $9.1 billion figure that is used the most often is a snapshot that the Treasury Board Secretariat took of programming across the Government of Canada in 2005-06. This is all on the Internet, and we can work with the cle

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  The reason for the second case would be that the supplementary estimates are for 2006-07, and that year is going to finish in two weeks. You're worried about whether there will be money there on April 1 for 2007-08?

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There are a lot of programs that technically finish on March 31. There will be a lot next year. We're going through the process now of finding the right assurances for people and of communicating these to them. I'm not worried about the urban aboriginal strategy or the Powley fun

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  That's to try to change the tool kit. I guess my other role, which you alluded to, is to work with the tools I have. So to that extent, we still have to work with contribution agreements, and then we simply have to manage them, as Ms. Crowder said, to take out as much of the bure

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  It will be there, and I'm quite confident it will be pretty much what we funded this year. We're trying to find a way to communicate that to the recipients in a way that helps them plan. It's not the best way to do things, I understand, because they go with a great deal of uncert

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I may get in a little over my head here, Mr. Chairman, but the panel was created by the government—last spring, I think it was—to look at grants and contributions funding as a tool of public policy. There's a lot of grant contribution funding. We are probably one of the biggest p

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There were two other questions there, Mr. Chairman. I'll try to move very quickly.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Could we begin with the residential schools?

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Thank you. We can always follow them up later. There may be two points I could make about the latitude we have. First, according to the rules laid down by the act and by Treasury Board, if we have not spent all of our operational budget, we can transfer up to 5% of the total