We are moving along to page 9-19, legal aid services, activity summary, operations expenditure summary, $4.978 million. Ms. Bisaro.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a question with regard to the acknowledged backlog in the legal aid department. I know that the Minister has spoken about that before. I wondered if I could get an update on whether or not there has been some progress on this backlog since we reviewed the business plans in November and, if there is any, when there might be an expectation that this backlog would be gone. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Lafferty. Ms. Schofield.

Thanks for that. It is good to hear that things are improving. Is there a standard or a measure that the department uses to provide what might be considered optimum service in terms of having to wait for a legal aid lawyer? Thank you.

Thanks for the response. I appreciate that you can’t maybe give a hard and fast answer, but I would have hoped that this would be an activity that the department would try to provide some reporting on next year when we look at business plans. I would suggest that perhaps there ought to be an identified length of time that is sort of appropriate or an estimate what the department thinks is maybe possible to be achieved and that they can then look at doing some reporting back against that particular measure. It is an issue that certainly the Social Programs committee has been aware of for a while now. I think we probably will be keeping an eye on it. If there is a measure that the department can report on, that certainly would forestall any questions and we would be able to see improvements over time. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Lafferty.

Mr. Chairman, certainly there is always room for improvement as well, especially with respect to the reporting mechanism and the length of time. So, yes, we will commit to doing that area of work that the Member alluded to. Mahsi, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Minister Lafferty. Next on my list is Mr. Ramsay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just had a few questions on the Family Law Clinic. The money that is earmarked for family law, $354,000, seems to me to be a fairly low number. I was wondering if the Minister has a breakdown of what that $354,000 goes towards. I would like to get a better understanding of how much money we are spending on mediation for families going through family breakup as opposed to spending it on lawyers. If the Minister has that type of information, I would appreciate it.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Minister Lafferty.

Mr. Chairman, certainly we can provide that information to the Members, but most of the funding is towards the salaries. Mahsi.

What specifically in terms of services is the department providing people going through family breakup that would be eligible for legal aid? What type of programs and services are

there for people? How much money are we spending in that area? Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, any information that we have is in the areas of family law mediators. The court workers also play a great role in these areas. Education program parenting after separation and divorce. Those are the areas that have been in the works. Mahsi, Mr. Chairman.

Thanks to the Minister. I am trying to get a better understanding of how the department is trying to steer people away from the court system and mediate people or help them get through the hurdles of family breakdown. I was wondering if the Minister has a number on what the department is paying for these mediators as opposed to the lawyers and going through the court process, because I am a big believer in mediation. I think the more people we can help out in that regard is better than spending money on lawyers and going through the adversarial court proceedings. I hope the Minister does have that level of detail. Thank you.

Certainly the family law mediation project will certainly start again in February, as we speak, and also the funding allocated is $40,000 towards this program for fiscal year 2008-09. Mahsi, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate that answer from the Minister. I just wanted to go on record as saying I think that number is woefully low. I think that there is much more that the government can and should be doing for families who would qualify for legal aid in the area of family breakdown. If it is $40,000 and the program is just starting in February, that is nice to hear the program is starting, but I think that there is a lot of people that we can steer away from the court system, the lawyers and the three-month-long wait that it takes to even get a lawyer. The more people we can put through mediation the better. I would suggest we try to find some more money and we start to try to steer people towards mediation as opposed to the court system when it comes to family breakdown. Forty thousand dollars, to me, is a pretty small amount to be putting at a problem this large. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, certainly there are proposals being submitted to the federal government. Those are the areas that we need to focus on. Yes, I agree that we should throw more money in these areas, but we have to work with what we have. But at the same time we will be pressuring the federal government to allocate additional funding and stress the need for an increase in this funding as well. We will continue to do our part, Mr. Chairman, pushing the federal government further with this. Mahsi.

Thank you, Minister Lafferty. We are on page 9-19, legal aid services, activity summary, operations expenditure. Mr. Ramsay.

I thank the Minister for that. I think, obviously, there is a tremendous amount of money that is being spent if you look at the Legal Services Board, the legal aid staff lawyers, the Family Law Clinic. There is money there. What I am saying is we should try to change the way we think and come up with some more money and try to balance things a little bit more so that we are spending and putting more of an effort into mediation as opposed to lawyers and court. It is unfortunate that many people, when they go through family breakdown or breakup, they end up in the court system tying up resources when, in some cases...Not all. Some are going to end up in court. But wherever possible, we should keep them out of court and mediate a settlement up front. I think it is money well spent, Mr. Chairman. I don’t need a response to that. I just want to get on record on that one. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. That was just a comment. We are on page 9-19, legal aid services, activity summary, operations expenditure summary, $4.978 million.

We are moving along to page 9-20, legal aid services. This is an information item only, active positions. Mr. Krutko.