Order, please.
This is meeting number nine of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development on Wednesday, March 11, 2009. Today we are continuing our review of key elements of Canadian foreign policy.
Testifying before us today we have Howard Mains, a member of the board of directors from the Canadian American Business Council.
I must say we have one guest who has not shown up yet and we haven't had any information as to him not being here.
But we are also very pleased to have Jack Granatstein, historian and professor. He has appeared before our committee in the past and has authored a number of books. We've always appreciated your comments at committee.
Our committee provides time for opening statements from each one our guests. Then we would proceed into the first round of questioning, which would be a 10-minute opening statement and then seven minutes.
Perhaps I'll start with Mr. Mains, because it's my understanding that he's filling in for someone who couldn't be here and he does have to take a conference call in about 20 minutes. Mr. Mains, please go ahead.