Environment committee  Mr. Chair, with regard to that particular agency, if that was the question, the decision of the government was to not spend any money. Essentially the whole organization was being wound down. We discussed this at the standing committee in October of last year. The reason they're presented in the estimates is to provide a crosswalk, if you like, of what would have been spent had there been permission to go forward, but there was no permission.

Environment committee  For 2005-06 we had $512 million for climate change programs. So that was for one year.

Environment committee  I think it's like Mr. Mokhtar has said. We had a number of programs in, let's say, climate change and other areas that were sunsetting, for which they were to get further priority established this fiscal year under the previous government. The current government is looking at setting priorities, so we'll see what will happen in terms of funding.

Environment committee  Yes, I'd be very happy to. Thank you very much for raising this question. If you turn to page 8-5 in the main estimates, this relates to the first comment I made in the opening remarks, that we did change our program activity architecture. I know that's technical. What that means is that how we define our results was changed.

Environment committee  Thank you.

Environment committee  I'm not sure I'm familiar with that particular one. But I could say this, that Environment Canada works in such a horizontal manner that we work very much on many different files horizontally with a number of organizations.

Environment committee  I'll provide some contextual comments and then ask my colleague Mr. Manson to provide further details. Generally speaking, concerning your comment about whether we work together horizontally, I'd like to say that our policy branch chairs a committee that sets objectives for sustainable development.

Environment committee  Thank you for your question. I will try to answer it accurately and clearly. For discussions of carbon, I will continue in English because I am more familiar with the technical terms in that language. I would simply like to specify that with respect to ...emission credits for Kyoto per se, we have not spent any money on that.

Environment committee  Thank you for the question. From memory, and—I will ask Mr. Mokhtar if he has more information to provide—the amounts we are speaking of are not very high, and I would be surprised if research has been conducted into measuring the effectiveness of the investment. I believe that it may represent a few hundred dollars, or at most a few thousand, but no more than that.

Environment committee  Mr. Mokhtar?

Environment committee  Thank you very much for your question. Here again, I would ask Mr. Mokhtar for the details, if there are any. These amounts related somewhat to the basic rules and principles governing our contributions and grants. Ms. Gélinas and the Auditor General mentioned that more was needed.

Environment committee  An amount of $6.4 billion?

Environment committee  Yes, it is.

Environment committee  Thank you very much for the question. Generally speaking, I think the whole government is looking at trying to make sure we get the best performance out of our grants and contributions programs. I think the results of the blue ribbon panel on that will be coming forward in December.

Environment committee  Absolutely, you can ask the question and we can provide you with further details on that. I'll ask Mr. Mokhtar to provide further details, but a lot of our grants and contributions are not a large amount; a lot of them are a small amount, going to a wide variety of stakeholders.