Mr. Todd.

Well, clearly, we need to ensure that the House and the Members through committees, or however we structure it, are directly involved in the process. I mean, otherwise, we will get what we normally get, and that is the accusations as we frequently see from others out there of political favouritism, pork bellying - a favourite word by some I understand - et cetera. So, I mean, I want to be clear, and I have said it before, this is not a panacea for our economic woes. This is not going to solve all our infrastructure problems.

This is just one small way of trying to regroup and find a way to get back up to where we were historically in our spending, so we can maintain the kind of levels of infrastructure that the constituency at large expects of us. What will drive this whole policy, certainly while I am here as the Finance Minister, will be affordability and transparency to ensure that everybody understands what is happening, why it is happening. Projects, I hope, will be selected on need, and as I said, return on investment. Those discussions are underway right now; and again, once we have some clarity on all the questions that have been asked, not only by this House, by others, advocacy groups I met with, we will provide it to the House and we will hopefully give you the comfort you need to answer some of the essential questions that are currently being asked. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Mr. Steen.

Thank you. The Minister responsible for the Financial Management Board.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I will refer that question to the Minister of Health.

Minister of Health and Social Services, Mr. Ng.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in respect to the financial controls that the department deals with our funding agreements with the regional health and social services board; they report to us on a quarterly basis on their financial activity so that we can continue to monitor them. What I would also like to say, as I have indicated last fall, is in respect to some of their program operations, not the financial aspect, the department has structured a monitoring and evaluation unit as a result of some of the issues that were brought up last fall in some of the program changes that some of the boards were contemplating. We had set up that evaluation unit to make sure that we would not potentially get into the situations of boards running programs that might be contrary to what we thought were in the best interests of their constituents. Thank you.

Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Steen.

The Minister of Finance. Could you repeat your question, Mr. Steen?

The Minister of the Financial Management Board. Mr. Todd.

My department, the Department of Finance, would not get involved in the program delivery. We get involved in the fiscal accountability of how government monies are spent and we work closely with all departments to do that. Our responsibility and role is one of good fiscal management of government dollars, and we play a role in that with my honourable colleagues, Ministers who are responsible for the program. We do not get involved directly in the programs. Thank you.

Oral questions. Supplementary, Mr. Steen.

The Minister of the Financial Management Board, Mr. Todd.

Yes, I apologize to my colleague. I did not quite fully understand the question. I do now. The Financial Management Board, which is made up all of my Cabinet colleagues, myself as the Chair, has the responsibility and makes decisions on how the government spends its money and its policies, et cetera. Cabinet deals with issues like the overall performance of government, a particular department or a particular Minister, et cetera. We have the fiscal responsibility, the Financial Management Board, to protect and spend and authorize, and so on, the fiscal framework of government. Cabinet, chaired by the Premier, has the overall responsibility for programs, policies, et cetera. Thank you.

Oral questions. Final supplementary, Mr. Steen.

Mr. Todd.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I just want to get clarity from my honourable colleagues. No, the FMB did not deal with this issue, as I said, that would be a Cabinet issue. Thank you.

Thank you. Oral questions. Mr. O'Brien.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Minister responsible for Health and Social Services. Mr. Speaker, there is a concern in my community with the nursing shortage that a mentorship program that has been proposed that would enable recent graduates to obtain some training prior to pursuing their career is in jeopardy because of this shortage. I would ask the Minister if he would agree to look into this to ensure that this program will continue. Thank you.