Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do feel that the MOU is a pivotal issue. I am one of the people who had the pleasure of working on that for a while. I shouldn't say pleasure. I know it is a frustrating experience. I was being a little ironic there, perhaps. I always thought, when that process was initiated, that the division was simple. The department's role was territorial-wide planning, policy, legislation and financial dealings with Ottawa, and that the boards could carve off and very usefully deal with the day to day administration of health services in their region.
I felt that if the boards basically could be given more freedom and flexibility to do that day to day work and perhaps the department could not keep quite such a close watch on their day to day responsibilities, correspondingly, the boards could agree that the policy, planning and territorial-wide financial issues and accountability of the Legislative Assembly would be a matter for the Minister of Health, with which they need not interfere. That was how, in my simplistic mind, I saw the MOU working out.
I haven't been briefed on all of the good work I know that has been done on that MOU over the last number of months. There have been consultations and meetings. Is that the general tenor of the MOU? The boards will have a clear authority carved out to deal with the day to day issues in their region and perhaps some more flexibility and autonomy than they now have, but they will in turn agree that the Minister has the duty to do territorial-wide policy, planning, legislation and the big picture budget issues. Is that what we are aiming for with this MOU as it is being developed?