Thank you, Mr. Chairman and honourable members. I'll try to be relatively brief.
We're here to support the changes to the legislation that are in Bill C-38.
Capital is critical to building a new wireless company in Canada, as Mr. Wong just said. I can agree with most of what he said. The two key ingredients for creating a competitive environment in the wireless industry are exactly that: capital and spectrum. This is one critical component of improving the situation for capital, to support investment in these companies.
Progress has been made, and I won't get into the debate here on how much has been accomplished on the spectrum side, but certainly in the last auction, through the set-aside, the government created an environment that allowed new entrants. The fact that three of us are sitting here today is an example that that has been an accomplishment. The fact that Vidéotron is operating along with us in Quebec as new entrants is an accomplishment that came about because of that policy.
Capital continues to be important. There's a real challenge in Canada with getting access to risk capital. We have an immature market for capital. It's not just a matter for wireless innovation or wireless investment, but it's a matter of, generally, innovation, the knowledge economy, and IT and broader sectors in Canada. The institutional investors that are very strong in the U.S. and very strong in some other markets are weaker in Canada, for historical reasons. A number of steps are being taken to address that, but a big step that could help in this case, which isn't an issue with some of those other areas, is enabling capital and investment to come in from outside the country, from foreign companies and foreign investors.
That's valuable, because when foreigners invest in new entrants like ours, they invest in Canada. Every single employee of Public Mobile is in Ontario and Quebec. This has nothing to do with the ownership structure. It has to do with the fact that our customers are in Ontario and Quebec, and our networks are in Ontario and Quebec, because that's where our licences are. That will continue independent of who ultimately owns the investment and equity in the company. That's where they're going to stay because that's where our business is and where it happens.
To the extent we're able to attract additional further investment from investors outside the country, that investment is coming in to provide jobs and to build infrastructure in Ontario and Quebec, where we operate today. That is all to the benefit of Canada, independent of who ultimately owns the company. It is something that is not only bringing more competition to Canadians and more choice to Canadian consumers, but is bringing additional jobs and so on to Canada, all of which is a benefit to Canada.
I always find it fascinating when Bell says this is bad because all these scary things will happen. Bell opposed competition in long distance because it would be bad for Canadians. They opposed competition in local because it would be bad for Canadians. They opposed steps to improve Internet access by competition because it would be bad for Canadians. They opposed setting aside spectrum in the last auction because it would be bad for Canadians. They opposed using caps to improve access to spectrum in the auction coming up because it would bad for Canadians. They've opposed better access to foreign capital for small or new entrants because they say it would be bad for Canadians.
In every case they have failed, and ultimately, the outcome has been good for Canadians, in the sense that in all those sectors, there has been more competition, better pricing, more options for Canadians, and, ultimately, more employment with new entrants that have come into these markets.
For all those reasons I think the bill should be supported as it stands.