Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you all for joining us this afternoon.
I'd like to begin with a question to Mr. Galloway and, I think, Ms. Wilding too.
Mr. Galloway, you mentioned payroll taxes in your brief and possible reductions. But as you may know, the latest government budget document foresees substantial increases in employment insurance premiums, beginning in 2011, to the point where for a two-earner family, the additional cost would be $1,200; and for a 10-person firm, the additional cost would be $9,000.
We all agree, or at least I believe—I won't speak for the others—that employment insurance should be balanced over the cycle. But there are different ways of defining the cycle, and the proposed increases are quite substantial; the curve is steep. An alternative would be to have lower increases in employment insurance and to take a longer time, more years or a more gradual approach, to balance the fund.
Given that the Toronto Board of Trade has many business members and that Mr. Galloway has mentioned it, my question to you is whether, from your point of view, you would prefer to see these abrupt increases in EI premiums or more gradual ones.