Thank you very much, Mr. Fergus.
I am going to speak French first, but I may speak English afterwards.
In my opinion, there are two main reasons why it is important for Canada to increase its support for the social sciences and humanities.
First, it is increasingly obvious that this will be essential for our economy. Over the past 10, 15 or even 20 years, some people have maintained that our economy and future depended entirely on the physical sciences, or new technologies.
However, today, we are not sure how we will develop those technologies in the future. We need flexible employees who are able to meet different challenges. They have to have the intellectual and personal skills that allow them to work effectively with many people, using different approaches that allow them to communicate
and to think critically. That's the first thing.
I think that increasingly we're going to need more adaptive and more innovative people to succeed in a world where technological change is so fast and, frankly, so hard to predict.
The other thing, as this government knows well, is that the country has many social challenges that are issues we want to address as Canadians, not only because we care about our quality of life and justice but also because they have real financial implications. If we take indigenous reconciliation as an example, not only have we made a commitment as a country to reconcile and confront the legacy of that history but there are also potentially huge economic benefits for Canada as well. If we can learn how to free up the potential in those communities and empower those people, they have an enormous contribution to make to our economy.