Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, in the area of our procurement and how we contract our services, as Mr. Voytilla stated, the new system we're hoping to have in place would give us the ability to monitor on a much closer basis how the government and how government money is being spent. If issues come up, it will be able to identify those, then we would be able to further check into them to ensure that departments and government overall are following the policies that are put in place. So ultimately it would be the new system that we would have in place that would allow us to do a better role in monitoring. That function would fall through government accounting. As for a point of contact in that area, that would be more difficult because, as stated, this would allow us to look at how we do things and report on them. I don't know if we would have one person established directly with this. It might cover a number of areas. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm glad that the Minister responded well with me in terms of my question. I understand what the Minister is saying. It does require some very delicate stick-handling, coordination with other departments and the roles that each department will play. I imagine it's more of a coordination effort. I know that's going to require some time. I am encouraged to hear from Mr. Roland and Mr. Voytilla in terms of establishing a new system on monitoring these contracts on a government-wide basis and how they work the internal process amongst the interdepartmental...I guess that'll be another area requiring some more discussion. However, is there any way that when they start developing this new system that they would somehow have a method of communicating, I imagine, with each other in terms of some of the issues that may fall between the cracks in between the departments and FMBS as the mother umbrella, I guess you say, in terms of procurement contracts and how these types of contracts are monitored? So there's some avenues to where people can at least be notified who to contact if they have issues that come up that they want clarified or confirmed by the government. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, as we go down this path of a new system and the selection process and how we establish it as we proceed, it will allow us to do some of this work that the Member is talking about of how we ensure that we don't, I guess, create an environment where things would fall between the cracks. Ultimately it is the job of the Financial Management Board Secretariat to ensure, especially the government accounting section, that the departments are following our policies that we do put out there. As in every case, to try to catch every transaction would be somewhat difficult in any environment when you look at the transactions that take part day to day, but hopefully this new system would allow us and would, I guess in a sense, trigger an event if something was to come up and showed that one of our policies wasn't followed, or I guess as this system's called, red flags would come up and give us indication that we need to do further investigation. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Yakeleya.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Is there any type of discussion happening within his department and other government departments in terms of looking at some of these issues we have talking about in terms of one...or how we have to wait for the study of the report to come back and look at the new system? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, because this is a very large project and it crosses all departments in the sense of monitoring and the systems working, we would set up a cross-departmental team that would look at how this would flow out and how we would incorporate all things we feel needs to be in place. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Next I have Ms. Lee.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have just a quick question on this environmental liability issue. Not long ago, AOC reviewed the Auditor General's report where the Auditor General raised questions about the differences between the calculations of environmental liability that GNWT does and how she thought it should be done. I am

just wondering if we have been able to address those. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, from the work we've done with the Auditor General's office in this area, it was more the work that was done in accounting for our environmental liabilities. So that has been the area that we have been focussing on, and some of the work that Mr. Voytilla mentioned earlier is stemming from that area of having to do an accounting of it and establish environmental liabilities. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Ms. Lee.

Thank you. I always did understand that to be an accounting issue and a numbers issue, but I still would like to know whether the differences, how they should be accounted, because it does matter what goes on the books than what our liabilities are, I believe, because these are accounting numbers. I would like to know, and I can't remember exactly what the issues that Madam Fraser was thinking about. I can't remember exact specific issues, but I recall that there were some important differences that the Auditor General and government had. I would like to get some more information. I understand that there could be differences in how two different accountants, about how the books should be kept. So I would like to think that those are having results or being worked on. I would just like to get that information. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Lee. Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, this area is one that has been brought up in the past from time to time and we have had a number of discussions, and discussions about process and how things are following through from the details of this last round and what we are doing to address some of the concerns. At times, I guess, flat out, I must say that there are differences of opinions at times. We are following the rules that are established and working with that, but we still do find from time to time that there are differences in interpretation and so on.

The work that has been done to date, I will have Mr. Voytilla give that detail.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Mr. Voytilla.

Thank you, Mr. Voytilla. Ms. Lee.

Thank you very much. I appreciate that answer. Just a follow-up on that. What is the dollar amount in the difference we are talking about? I would like to know what the impact of that difference in dollar amount is. Whether it is by effort or methodology, is there a dollar amount difference still? What kind of impact does that have on our liability on the books? Thank you.

Thank you. Can I just ask Members, if they want to have any side discussions, to step out, please? Mr. Roland.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, as Mr. Voytilla has stated, the issue that we have had, or the Auditor General has had with us, is the effort in the amount of the accounting of liabilities out there, the valuation of those. There is no established number at this point that we are disputing. It is the fact that we need to get out there and establish what the liabilities are. It is a matter of getting into the field, doing site assessments and quantifying what those environmental liabilities would be on the accounting side. That is the piece being criticized about. We haven't done, in their eyes, enough to quantify and value that liability that is out there. That is what this is starting to do, is to get out there, establish that and do the work around that area. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Roland. Ms. Lee.