Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Minister Strahl, for coming to the committee today. I know that ever since you received this important appointment, you've really embraced this bill and of course the work that needed to be done in order to bring it to fruition.
I have seen the amount of effort that has been put in, not only by your staff and the department, but also by the AFN. There needs to be a lot of credit extended to them for the important work they did in assisting on the drafting of this bill. I think it really speaks to the fact that in a democracy there are times when parties can come together and really do excellent work in areas on which they can find agreement, and I think obviously this is a really strong example of that.
I know that you've really taken an initiative on this. Perhaps you could talk a bit about how you see this as a very substantive, systemic reform, especially in relation to what we've seen as a massive growth in outstanding claims over the last number of years, and really how this has been a priority for you and how you think this will begin to find a way to diminish that massive number of outstanding claims that we have.