Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I would like to thank you, Minister, for coming to testify before the committee today. I have a lot of questions to ask you.
In May 2008, the Minister of Industry refused to allow the $1.3 billion sale of MDA to the American firm ATK because he was not satisfied that acquisition of the information systems division of MDA proposed by ATK would likely be of net benefit to Canada. He added that “where a significant transaction does not demonstrate net benefit to Canada, it cannot be approved”, and accordingly Canada rejected the sale.
With the current stock market crash, shares are dropping rapidly. Does the Minister acknowledge that raising the automatic threshold for review by the Department of Industry to $1 billion amounts to abandoning and running away from his responsibilities for one of our leading industries, aeronautics, which is active in Montreal particularly?