Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I disagree with the recommendation from the Standing Committee on Finance that if this motion passes, that means we're going towards party politics where we would be letting the Premier select Cabinet Ministers. The position from my area and some of my colleagues on this side of the House is we agree that we don't want to go too far with the particular amendment we have in front of us. I think, to a certain extent, it gives authority to the Premier to dismiss.

Members will recall that in between sessions is when we have a problem. The problem I don't have to indicate, but we ran into a number of problems within this 12th Assembly where the Premier had her hands tied; even though she received unsigned letters of resignation she couldn't discipline those particular Ministers. Because of that, the Standing Committee on Finance has indicated that we should make provisions in the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act so the Premier would have that authority, but not to give her the full authority to hire and fire the Ministers. I wouldn't want to bind the hands of the 13th Assembly, I would prefer to leave that discussion to the next group coming in to determine how they would select the Premier or the process they would like to use. There are a number of options available to them, and I feel that making this type of recommendation now would mean that the government would have to react to this particular recommendation and bring forward amendments in our June session. That would definitely tie the hands of the next people coming in to determine what process they want to use.

In that respect, Mr. Chairman, I will not be supporting this particular recommendation by the Standing Committee on Legislation. Thank you.