Thank you, Mr. Chair. As the Member has indicated, safety and integrity of our infrastructure is very important to us and to the Department of Transportation as we operate our highway system.

As the Member has mentioned, though, that operation is presented with quite a few challenges at times. We do have a number of different ways and things we’re doing just to ensure the integrity and safety of that infrastructure and the safety.

There is a process in place when there is an emergency situation. For example, when the culvert collapsed on Highway No. 7, we were able to get the highway reopened within 24 hours, and within about six months we had a new structure in place to deal with that problem. Our government was able to respond to that.

At the same time, we’ve recognized for a couple of years now that infrastructure, particularly bridges and culverts, are aging and that we need to be more diligent and more deliberate in our inspections. There is some additional money that’s been given in the last couple of years to establish

more formally some bridge inspection programs to ensure we are fully aware of the condition of our assets and the infrastructure out there.

Highway No. 7 I guess presents another unique challenge in that when we’d gone back and tried to assess what exactly happened, it was a whole chain of events that seemed to lead to the situation we had this past summer, an unfortunate situation. Trying to, you know, plan ahead when it does take time to see the capital dollars and time to get the capital dollars through the process does create some challenges for us, but there is money in our capital plan for Highway No. 7 and to continue to address some of the additional needs that are on the highway. We were able to get the highway back open after some considerable effort this summer.

The final point. There is $59 million here. We have a highway system that stretches from north to south. It’s a very extensive highway system, and $59 million allows us to address the needs on all our different highways and not just focus on one or two problem areas.