Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The suggestion I am going to make is that if there is interest and concern about the terms of employment of these former staff people, what the terms and conditions were, how were they arrived at and who negotiated them, as well as the conditions under which they left and the negotiation of these packages that the Members are expressing concern about, Members have already spent a good part of a morning going through this. The fact is that it is far better if they ask me about it and they ask the secretary to Cabinet, Liz Snider.

Mr. Handley was not involved in these things and he is not in any position to answer the questions that you are asking.

Nobody is denying the Members information. They simply should have asked and attended the sessions where the questions were asked yesterday. I know that Ms. Snider is prepared to answer the questions because she arrived at the contracts with the people involved and she, along with support staff, negotiated the severance packages, if that is what you call them, and brought them to me in both instances for signature.

If they want to know whether due process was followed and why those numbers are the way they are, it is far better for a committee to respect confidentiality and deal with it behind closed doors while we are talking about individuals and for public views, I think more than marginal about confidentiality.