The one valuable commodity that we are running out of, Mr. Speaker, is time. There is no question. I would remind everybody that there are 22 months left, if there is going to be an election in Nunavut in February of 1999, assuming that it is there. The reality is 22 months left. So time is a valuable commodity; it is actually even more valuable than money at this stage, in my opinion. My honourable colleague is correct. We need to provide a pre-implementation plan, there are some things that we have to do now, sooner rather than later. That has been my attitude from the very beginning. It has to be approved, as my honourable colleague said, by all the players to make sure that we are all happy, if that is at all possible, and we need to ensure that it is done in a timely and orderly way. We need to, more importantly, establish what can we realistically accomplish in the 22 months that are left.
I think it would be fair to say that we are gearing up the Division Secretariat to ensure that we do have a plan in place that will accomplish what I believe are the bare minimums that are required. I am confident that, once we receive the response from the other parties, and hopefully consensus will be reached, we can then move forward in terms of negotiations that I talked about the day before yesterday or yesterday, I believe, on the fiscal framework necessary for the two governments.
I have struggled for awhile here. I still have to understand and we have to reach consensus on what the basic core framework of the new government is going to look like so we can cost it. Nobody in NIC has taken the time to cost the new government as they currently are proposing, never mind any amended designs that may come about through discussions with the two other parties. This has got to be done quickly. We are simply running out of time. Thank you.