Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First of all, I believe that it is actually 11 departments, although we have been saying 10, but it is 11, just for clarity's purpose. I think I agree with my honourable colleague that when you do the kind of shrinking that we have done, you need to be able to not only shrink, but to look how efficiently we can do our work. My honourable colleague, Mr. Arlooktoo, had alluded to it in the earlier discussion this week with respect to the on-going direction that I have given to Ministers through the FMB, that it has to be a continuing on-going analysis of how we are doing things.
I am fundamentally of the belief that a decentralized form of authority, and that when you decentralize authority, you put the decision making closer to the issues, therefore, you hope that in the long run, one, the decisions will be more sound, and two, they will be more efficient. There is no audit going on in relationship to the efficiency of government, but there is an overall thrust in our decentralization and delegation of authority, the managers, that in doing that we must run things more efficiently. There is no, I do not have under way right now because our agenda has been so full, I do not have under way right now, any deliberate or direct review of red tape, I think it would be fair to say that.
On the issue of affirmative action and its linkages with the northern employment strategy, I have already said to this House on a number of occasions and apologize to this House for the fact that we have not moved as aggressively as we would like on this strategy. There will be linkages between them both. We are close to bringing the strategy forward. It is our intent to bring the strategy to committee first, during this session. As I said in the House last time, to seek on-going input and direction from it, to move quickly to come to grips with it, try to get approval in general at the end of May and implement as early as June or July of this coming year. Thank you.