Thank you, Madam Chair. In the area of formula financing, that is something that is critical to our government in trying to come up with new revenues that we have put forward. Specifically on the five percent reduction area, I believe we have a very good business case. I have had a discussion with the federal Finance Minister on this area. He's told me two things that he is not going to stray from; one is he will not bring in a deficit and, two, he will treat everybody equitably.

For me, there are a few messages that aren't so positive; one, we are running a deficit and, two, equity is a concern to us because we are not the same as southern jurisdictions. We are not the same as Alberta, B.C. or Ontario. It's a principle we have to live by and on that one, I think we can show that it is equitable that we get that five percent put back into our base because they have brought the numbers back up to 1996 numbers. That hasn't occurred in our case because CHST again doesn't impact us the same way as it does in provinces.

With the jurisdictions having their numbers brought up in that case, it's only right in having equitable treatment to have that restored to our base. I don't think it's a lost cause and I guess I will bring in my hockey experience. You don't quit playing the game until the final buzzer goes and that's my intention. If we have a chance of getting some new revenues through our solid arguments, then we will continue to put them forward. There will come a time in some of these other initiatives we have that we are going to have to say it's not achievable in this time and we must look at other initiatives. There are times when we are going to have to look at what we are doing as a government and decide at that point if we should further travel down that trail or change our direction. Thank you.