Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Minister, thank you so much for being here today. We really appreciate your presence.
You mentioned earlier that Prime Minister Cameron, right here in our own Parliament, spoke about how the Canadian financial system is a model for others around the world. I just want to cite a few others who have mentioned the same thing.
President Obama a couple of years ago said that in the midst of the enormous economic crisis Canada has shown itself to be a very good manager of the financial system and the economy in ways that the U.S. hasn't always been.
Ireland's Independent newspaper said recently that Ireland's financial regulatory system is due for a radical overhaul, with the Canadian system being held up as a role model.
Last week I was in Washington and had a number of meetings with various congressmen on both the House side and the Senate side. I guess The Washington Times must have known I was there, because I caught an article whose headline was, “America, home of the free. Canada, home of the future”. The first paragraph is, and I'll quote it: “Canada has strong banks, a stable real estate market and rock-bottom corporate tax rates, and it's about time Americans paid attention....” That was from The Washington Times last week.
I want to also say that throughout my meetings with members of the House and members of the Senate, the Canadian story is well known down in Washington, as you probably know. We are being looked at as a role model of how to craft a secure and stable financial regulatory system. It makes you feel proud, when you're down there and speaking to senior legislative officials of the United States government and they have that to say about our country's financial system.
Being from Toronto and from Ontario, I just want to ask you this. There are 400,000 jobs that are directly linked to the financial system; the job rate has grown 42% over the last ten years in the financial system; and 280,000 additional jobs are ancillary to the financial system. So clearly the financial system plays a key role in the economy of the province of Ontario, particularly in the city of Toronto.
Notwithstanding what we have here in Bill S-5, the government has taken a number of other steps along the way in the last number of years to further secure our financial system, in addition to what we see here in Bill S-5. Could you please talk about those?