Mr. Chairman, there is a significant amount of work going on in the systems and communications side of business. The Knowledge Management Strategy is guiding the work. Some of the work will be improvements to the existing system. Some of it will be consolidating, so that we are not dealing with as many different types of systems. Some of those initiatives will significantly improve the efficiency of the way the systems operate.

The firewall project the Member mentioned is an exceedingly important part of the improvements to the systems at the present time. The firewalls are intended to protect the integrity of all of the systems and all of the communication networks that the government currently has in place. It is doing it by essentially constructing a wall around those systems and only allowing certain types of entry. There is much more controlled entry than there has been in the past.

That system was implemented a couple weeks ago now, and with anything as complex as this, there are always some difficulties and some things that were not foreseen in the original plan. We are currently working through those.

Most of those issues that have been raised with us are relatively easily dealt with. We are down to a very small number of problems that we are still trying to deal with. Many of the concerns that have been raised appear to be related to personal preference in terms of how the system is used, rather than a significant functional problem with the system.

We are confident that over the next few weeks, those bugs will be worked out and we will have a much more secure system in place to protect all of the government's communication and computer systems.