Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I know quick access to capital is important. I wonder if I might ask a question to the researcher. In terms of Industry Canada, how much money wasn't spent in the last allocated budget in different departments? The minister himself has actually said, previous to the budget passing, that there was money available for the auto manufacturers immediately from the past budget. He said that very explicitly, publicly, a number of times before the budget was actually even brought forth.
So why we would have to wait for the Senate is one thing I would like to inquire about. And also regarding other departments, I know there has been some discussion in public about a number of different programs that haven't fulfilled their full mandates of the money that was allocated in a previous budget.
To Mr. Bali and Mr. Fedchun to start, with regard to the credit issue, do you feel confident with the EDC and the BDC? We've seen this coming down the road; in Ontario there have been 300,000 manufacturing jobs lost in five years. This latest chapter really heightened things even further, but we were going down that road; there's no doubt about it.
We would run into problems. For example, one plant in Essex County, a tier two supplier, had wages of $13 an hour, modest benefits, and they brought in robotics. They were selling parts for the Ford Escort, and it was selling well. But they were going to go bankrupt and had to turn away business because they couldn't get a bank loan at the proper rate. The bank increased its rates in a series of percentage points and actually took up the profit margin entirely. They went to the BDC, and the BDC said, “You know what? We'll give you the money. We'll back up the bank loan.” But they couldn't get the bank loan.
Do you feel confident that this problem can be solved? There has to be some accountability there. Once again, they were making a profit, a modest one, had modest wages—those wages are comparable to the United States and other jurisdictions—and robotics, and were very much a responsible company, and once again the bank profit level was taking up their entire business profit zone.