Transport committee  No.

Transport committee  We've got more and more competition in various parts of our economy in this country, and telecommunications would be a great example. I have to say, as a person in their fifties, that life is a lot better today with the telephone than it was when it was Ma Bell, Ma Bell, Ma Bell.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  No, I'm not familiar with other countries' tendering. I know how their unionization schemes work in terms of union membership and union dues—

Transport committee  —and they're unlike ours. They've reformed them. How that impacts tendering, I don't know. That's an area to study.

Transport committee  Well, what I know about Sweden, because there is a very, very important European human rights case from 2007, where a group of construction workers were paying their union dues to things that had nothing to do with their workplace. They ultimately won a victory against that, in that their money couldn't be taken to be used for non-bargaining purposes.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  LabourWatch's mandate is to provide information, so we don't actually go out and formally make submissions. We will respond to any request of any government to come before them and to answer questions, but you will not find, since the year 2000, any submission that we have voluntarily made in order to advocate for change in legislation.

Transport committee  Absolutely.

Transport committee  We have not.

Transport committee  Yes.

Transport committee  Not at all.

Transport committee  On an overall basis, government in this country is too big and does too many things. We would be a better nation and we would have better results if we had private sector enterprises competing on so many more things than we do. There is no reason to have most of the crown corporations we have in this country, and there are many government departments that should be radically smaller or simply not exist.

Transport committee  I am not an expert on public-private partnerships, and I didn't suggest that.

Transport committee  Yes. And if it's not there, then the dollars don't flow.