Thank you very much, Chair.
Thank you, Minister, for being here today.
Minister, as you know, I represent the riding of Ottawa Centre, which has been referred to as perhaps ground zero of the occupation, right outside this building. It was not just Wellington Street. It was beyond Wellington Street, in all the surrounding neighbourhood that is around Parliament Hill. It impacted hundreds of businesses, not to mention the Rideau Centre, which I'm sure many of us have frequented. It's one of the largest shopping malls in this city, employing thousands of people. On the eve of reopening after the mandate of closure by the provincial government, they were forced to shut down for three straight weeks.
We saw a real impact. In fact, my office fielded many questions from workers and from business owners who were seeking help—one, to end the blockade and occupation, and two, to give them financial support that would sustain them through that period.
Can you speak to, from your analysis, the specific economic harm that you were seeing of that ongoing occupation and, if you had not ended that occupation by way of invoking the Emergencies Act, the harm it would have had on Ottawa's economy? Can you also talk about what was happening at Windsor and the impact on our economy across Canada, at the Pacific crossing, Coutts and other border crossings as well?