Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I agree with a lot of the comments that Mr. Patterson has made.

We do see a grievance start out right at the workplace level that in hindsight could have been handled there, but there may be some inexperience on the part of a manager. Sometimes we see it's emotional. Sometimes we see that it just escalated because it just got out of hand. Other times it reaches us in Yellowknife and we will say that this maybe shouldn't have gotten here.

I agree that there is a problem, and I have spoken to the Premier about regional directors possibly having more of a role in this particular area at the regional level simply because I know that there is at least one regional director right now who is saving some of these grievances from occurring, and I think that more of these things could be resolved with some better training at the local level.

When it does occur, if the regional director or someone had the ability to intervene and sort of mediate the issue, we may see fewer grievances. Grievances, if we can keep them down, will mean fewer arbitrations, Mr. Chairman.

One of the problems that we have on those arbitrations right now is that there are so many that it's time consuming and difficult to deal with all of them. The union is aware of the problem, as are we. We have spoken about it and are trying to address those issues. So I am aware of the problem and we are doing what we can to resolve it, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.