Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and to the Minister, thank you for that explanation. Another area of this, as the Minister just pointed out, is the linkage that has been made that is in the formula with the performance or spending patterns of other jurisdictions in Canada.

I take this to mean, Mr. Chairman, that for instance, if the auto industry in Ontario and Quebec takes a nose dive and provincial spending levels are reflected in that, correspondingly there is a domino effect and agreements such as ours on a national scale are also impacted.

I wanted to ask whether that is a good reflection or a good way to manage a spending agreement. I would contrast it with, for instance, say a slowdown in the auto industry in eastern Canada. If our economy is strong and as vibrant as we hope it will be with oil and gas, pipelines and diamonds, then there is a kind of punitive impact there. The funding levels we would like to have to bolster that kind of economy is going to be dragged down because of what is happening thousands of kilometres away in another part of the country.

I guess I wanted to ask the Minister if I have that connection correctly stated and if it does work that way, what can we do, if anything, to disengage ourselves from that linkage, that imbalance? Thank you.