Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you to our witnesses for joining us and for what I thought were three interesting presentations.
In the time I have, Ms. Lissakers, I'd like to ask you to expand on or to explain the 2010 American law requiring the disclosure of payments to foreign governments. I find that as a basis for some transparency, and requiring that of companies.... There's a jurisdictional issue in Canada, of course, where securities commissions are a provincial jurisdiction, as opposed to a national one like the SEC in the United States.
Leaving aside the constitutional problems for a minute, I find that as a policy and as an objective it's very compelling, and I'm hoping you could answer what I thought.... I was trying to imagine what would be the objection from the extractive industries to that kind of provision. One would be, presumably, added costs or contracts they may have either with other governments or other private sector partners, or some competitive disadvantage. I'm wondering if you could enlighten us a bit on the debate that might have taken place in the United States.
Then, I'm hoping that Monsieur Gratton would in fact answer, on behalf of the Mining Association, as to whether he thinks that kind of measure might meet with some support among his membership in Canada. I was interested to hear that up to 50% of these companies are listed on a Canadian exchange. To me, that's a good start in bringing in some transparency, and some reassurance to the shareholders of those businesses that they're not participating in a circumstance that in the medium term or long term can lead to some considerable chaos.