Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I would like to welcome you, Mr. Johnston, to our committee this morning.
I have really appreciated the testimony you've given, and I do want to thank Mr. Paillé for recommending this study to our committee. I think it's been a very interesting study for us to pursue as it is a very important issue and one that I believe our government takes quite seriously, as demonstrated by the leadership of Minister Flaherty and the leadership he has shown in getting G-20 members to crack down on tax havens.
My colleagues mentioned that Canada has an extensive network of tax treaties, one of the largest in the world, with 87 treaties in force. It was also mentioned that currently there are 11 signed TIEA agreements, with 14 under negotiation. I just want to follow up on a couple of comments made by my colleagues across the way. These are the comments by Mr. Szabo, when he talked about if you have a tax treaty does it follow that you would have a TIEA in place, and then the comments Ms. Hughes made in regard to free trade agreements and whether we should be signing free trade agreements.
I'm wondering if you would comment on the relationship, if any, there is between a free trade agreement, a tax treaty, and what might fall into a TIEA.