Thanks, Chair.
In the opening comments from both of you—and your wording was very similar—you were talking about the concern that extended interswitching diverts jobs and traffic to the United States, and I quickly looked up the Stats Canada results. When extended interswitching was in place in the previous Conservative government, from 2014 to 2017, rail shipments from the prairie provinces to U.S. destinations were around 33% and went down during the period of extended interswitching. However, when extended interswitching was removed in 2017, the amount of traffic going from the prairie provinces to the United States actually went up to 37%, and to a similar number in 2019.
I'm just curious about that. If you're saying that extended interswitching is an unfair advantage that drives traffic to the United States, why do those numbers tell the opposite? How can you square that circle given the amount of traffic went down during interswitching and went up when interswitching was removed?