Under then Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the Conservative government gave a mandate to officials from the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development—now known as the Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Development Canada—to "negotiate a settlement with the Catholic entities" who had committed in the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (IRSSA) to raise $25 million to pay for healing programs for survivors. As a result, in August 2015, "negotiations began, resulting in a signed agreement on October 30, 2015, and a withdrawal of the Protective Notice of Appeal. Justice Neil Gabrielson had ruled on July 16, 2015 that the federal Conservative government under then Prime Minister Stephen Harper had "inadvertently released 50 Catholic entities from their contractual responsibility to try to raise up to $25-million for aboriginal healing programs". He said that lawyers on both sides—Alexander Gay representing the federal government and Gordon Kuski, representing the "Catholic entities" had a "meeting of the minds" on a "re-lease" of the Catholic entities from "all obligations". Justice Gabrielson ruled that Mr. Gay "should be presumed in this dispute to have had the authority to negotiate on behalf of the Canadian government".