Thank you very much.
Once again, I want to thank all the witnesses for their very enlightening presentations.
Dr. Simpson, thank you for your presentation.
You probably know that the federal government made a unilateral decision—without negotiating with the provinces—to reduce the growth of health transfer payments to the provinces. The growth rate will drop from about 6% to 3% a year over the next 10 years. You are asking the government for additional investments, so that you can develop a long-term strategy for population aging, which will put pressure on provincial budgets.
How can you reconcile that request—which I think is perfectly legitimate—with the government's decision to reduce the growth of funding? An increase of 3% is below the 5% to 5.5% increase in health care costs forecast by the Conference Board of Canada.