Page 8, Executive, operations and maintenance, directorate, special warrants, $1.7378 million. Agreed?

Agreed.

---Agreed

Human resource management, Mr. Gargan.

Mr. Chairman, I realize that I haven't made any general comments, but just going through this whole supplementary, there is a great deal of special warrants that have been utilized. Under directorate, they did some adjustments to establish six person years related to government organizational changes. The next special warrant was again, on the same day, for Finance and the Department of Personnel for a further 12.5 person years. Is there a reason why two special warrants were warranted for person years in one day?

Thank you. Mr. Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. If you go down the page, on June 8, there was 50.3 person years and so on and so forth. Mr. Chairman, this is the day that the changes came into place effect. People were moving from Personnel, the

Executive and the Department of Finance. Where you see it going into one particular place, later on in the supp you will see it coming out of another place, so that the amounts will offset. They were not new positions that were created, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Agreed.

---Agreed

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I understand that Personnel, who had formerly worked for the Department of Finance, are now being transferred to the Department of Executive, where they will report to a new Financial Management Board Secretariat. How does this affect the reporting relationships of people who had formerly worked in the Department of Finance in regions? Do those regional staff now report to headquarters, whereas they formerly reported to a superintendent in the regions? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, in the regions, there is a superintendent of FMBS. They have a financial arm, which was formerly the Department of Finance. They have a human resources arm, which was formerly the Department of Personnel. The reporting structure is that they report to FMBS now. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Minister of Finance is saying then that the employees reported to a regional superintendent before the reorganization and they continue to report to a first line authority, to a regional superintendent after the reorganization, so this does not represent a centralizing reporting relationship. It is basically a status quo, but it is simply in the Department of Executive, rather than Finance. Is that correct?

That is correct, Mr. Chairman, except that the Financial Management Board is a stand-alone outfit and merely receives administrative and financial services from the Department of the Executive. The Member is correct. It remains the same in the regions, it is just a different reporting structure. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

All of these new financial people are now in the FMBS, which is within the Department of Executive. The Premier is responsible for the Department of Executive, but the Minister of Finance shares the Financial Management Board. Who is the boss? Who's the political boss? Is it the chairman of the Financial Management Board who oversees the secretariat or is it the Premier within whose activity this secretariat resides? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I've always considered, since the day I started this job, that Madam Premier was the boss. In actual fact, within this particular operation, the FMBS is housed within the Executive merely for budgetary purposes and, to effect some efficiency, we also use the same administration and finance people as the Executive. We didn't feel it was necessary to go out and start up a new finance and administration for FMBS. I would risk the wrath of the Premier by saying that when it comes to matters of Finance and FMBS that I am, in fact, the boss, always recognizing that she is the supreme boss, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, thank you. I certainly hope I haven't got my friend, Mr. Pollard, into any trouble with these questions. Since I'm considering a motion to change the designation of the Government Leader, maybe I should be recommending that the title should be, "El Supremo."

---Laughter

Mr. Chairman, my final question on this is, when we come to the O and M budget in the new year, who will defend the budget of the FMBS within the Department of the Executive? Will it be the Minister of Finance or will this budget be presented and defended by the Premier herself? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, I will defend the FMBS budget as Mr. Kakfwi, who is also housed in the Executive, will defend his budget. If I recall correctly, when I was chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance, that's the same procedure that the former Government Leader allowed to happen when he came before the Standing Committee on Finance in this House. All the Ministers who had housed the departments within his Executive umbrella, defended their individual budgets before the House. That will continue, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.