Thank you, Mr. Chair, and good morning to each of our witnesses.
Being from Labrador, I certainly share the understanding of my colleague that we don't always fit into the definition of northern, at least in terms of this particular strategy, but I think that some of the things we'll talk about affecting the territories in this particular study will have some impact upon my riding or other northern regions, or the provincial north, as we shall say.
I want to touch base on a couple of points raised.
Mr. Thompson, in your presentation you talk about AHRDS. Of course it's been around for quite some time. You note that it is probably one of the more substantial programs in terms of the amount of money that is invested in aboriginal labour force development—13 agreements, $25 million. You say you're transitioning or building on this great success of AHRDS. Can you tell us what the nature of the aboriginal skills and employment training strategy is in this new strategy? There have been some concerns raised about delivery, whether you'll be going to call for proposals to deliver the program. I don't see how that would necessarily jive with the fact that you can say on one hand that it's been tremendously successful and then on the other hand say that it may go to a different type of delivery mechanism, in terms of requests for proposals.