Thank you very much, Mr. Chopra.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank you. As former Minister of Veterans Affairs, I really appreciated the leaflets you had produced to commemorate Remembrance Day that included a photograph of a little boy seeing his father go off to war and John McCrae's poem. I had those leaflets framed and put them on my desk.
On April 9, 2017, I'm sure you are planning a beautiful testimonial for the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge, which coincides with Canada's 150th anniversary. They say that was basically the birth of our country.
Speaking of the centennial, during the first 100 years of Canada Post's existence, your corporation delivered parcels and was profitable. So there was a business model that has evolved based on the Canadian population. We have seen that you have had to make business decisions that were not always popular, but that stemmed from your market analysis.
In my riding of Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, many constituents have rural boxes or access to centralized mail. I do. I live in Lévis, in the Saint-Rédempteur neighbourhood, and my mailbox is fortunately not too far.
In terms of fairness, I would like to point out that three out of four Canadians have no home delivery service. With you running a deficit in terms of your operations, it is as if three Canadians with no home mail service were being asked to fund a door-to-door delivery for the others. The discussions that will take place during consultations will definitely be interesting.
You are giving us an overview of the situation. You are telling us that Canada Post is at a crossroads owing to a dramatic drop in terms of mail. You're saying that the increase in parcels does not cover the losses caused by the drop in home-delivered mail. Ultimately, as I was saying earlier, you have a sword of Damocles hanging over your head—a $6-billion solvency deficit that is not accounted for. In addition, your momentum is being impeded. The nature of my colleague's questions indicated that the decisions of the current government to suspend your action plan will result in an additional loss of revenue of nearly half a billion dollars.
How do you see the consultation process? What would be your recommendations on the work we, parliamentarians, will have to do to avoid throwing out the baby with the bathwater? We want to keep Canada Post, but we want Canada Post to meet the contemporary needs of a changing market by using, as you said, the Internet, and by using online accounts. We also want to get our parcels and we want to know what your operating principles are. Which of your recommendations on those issues could be taken into account by the committee?