1. 

The Branch should develop and implement an informatics training plan that includes LIMS for all employees.

I agree with this recommendation. By the end of April 2001, we will have clearly identified training needs in the Branch in the area of informatics, especially with respect to LIMS. And this will be coordinated with the training plan established for the Branch by John Mark Keyes.

2. 

The Regulations Section should explore greater use of templates and macros and ensure that existing examples are shared among drafters, and revisors and jurilinguists who are preparing drafts.

I agree with the essence of this recommendation. As part of our new LIMS system, the Branch as a whole will establish an inventory of its most reliable macros and make them available to everyone.

3. 

When the functionality of LIMS has been settled and its human resource and other implications for the Legislative Services Branch more fully understood, Branch management should implement strategies that will ensure employee participation in planning and managing the transition to the new system.

I agree with the essence of this recommendation. The Branch is currently in the process of setting up a steering committee on LIMS. The Committee will include all key players in the Branch and also some representatives of other sectors of the Department, such as the Information Management Branch and the Communications and Executive Services Branch. LIMS implications for the Branch will be discussed at that forum and appropriate decisions made after appropriate consultations.

4. 

Regulations Section Management should examine the intake process of draft regulations from client departments and determine criteria for involving drafters early in the process.

I agree with the essence of this recommendation. Except for those cases that are clearly earmarked for the legislative paralegal stream, all regulations files go to lawyers first and must be examined by them before being submitted to either legislative revisors or jurilinguists.

5. 

Legislative Services Branch Management should examine the evolving roles of jurilinguists and revisors and develop a strategy aimed at reconciling the roles and responsibilities of these two groups. Such an examination should take account of the potential for greater use of paralegal services, addressed in Recommendation 6.

I agree with the essence of this recommendation. Our Branch Strategic Plan provides for the development, before the end of this calendar year, of a communications package whose purpose will be to explain to all Branch employees the different roles that are exercised in the Branch and how these various roles interact with and complement each other. The package will definitely clarify the respective roles of the legislative revisors and the jurilinguists.

6. 

In managing the regulations preparation and approval process, the Regulations Section should ensure that revisors and/or jurilinguists have sufficient opportunity to compare and review the final drafts of regulations in both languages to ensure consistency and freedom from error.

I agree with this recommendation, which is just as applicable to the Legislation Section. We took steps last year to facilitate the comparison and review of final drafts of bills and regulations in both languages. However, we need to remind drafters that they must allow sufficient time to jurilinguists to do their final comparison, and this is in the process of being done.

7. 

The current practice of the Legislative Services Branch is to utilize different approaches for preparing regulations, appropriate to the particular circumstances of client departments and the nature of the regulatory texts. While this approach is beneficial, the Branch should nevertheless identify, in a more explicit way, both the team and the process model that will be followed for the project particularly when drafting from instructions.

I generally agree with this recommendation. It must be recognized, however, that, given the number and huge diversity of files the Regulations Section has to handle, the flexibility of the processes we currently apply in dealing with regulations files addresses clients' needs very effectively and should remain the rule. Formality in our approaches should be minimal.

8. 

Legislative Services Branch Management should recognize the paralegal functions currently being performed by revisors and should review other functions to determine the appropriate additional use of paralegals. Such a review should include the development of criteria to determine when tasks should be assigned to Paralegals.

I agree. We are currently working on this. We have already classified a number of legislative paralegal positions. Our processes are slowly evolving in the right direction. The heads of the Legislation Section, the Regulations Section and the Editing and Publishing Services are currently working on establishing criteria to determine what files should be assigned to legislative paralegals. Our Branch Strategic Plan also covers this matter quite adequately.