Thank you very much, committee members. We appreciate the opportunity to provide some input on the future of Canada Post. Also, on behalf of the City of Yellowknife, I want to wish you all a very warm welcome to our community. I understand some of you were here recently, but it was a little bit warmer then, perhaps, so make sure you watch your step because it can be a little slippery out there.
Canada Post has long been an integral part of the communications and delivery service network throughout northern Canada. I think my colleague from the NWTAC will speak more to the community experience, but I wanted to touch on that because I think it's important.
Picking up on some of the questions from the last panel, I think by necessity, the north has to be treated a little bit differently from some other regions of the country that we would see. Many northern communities depend greatly on the services provided by Canada Post and will continue to do so. I think the national nature and mission of Canada Post, one of the reasons it was first created, was to take that national view of the country in terms of providing postal service at reasonable prices to all regions of the country. We continue to depend on that to a considerable degree. It's been integral in connecting many of our northern communities. Yellowknife has some advantages in terms of its connections with the rest of the country, but certainly we have many isolated and remote communities that are largely dependent on Canada Post and services like it for their connection to the rest of the country.
We know the world is evolving with the rapid advancement of information technologies, and mail service is obviously not immune. Having said that, the delivery of goods on which so many northerners rely, including here in Yellowknife, will continue to be a major factor in postal service in the north. While as a municipal government we always encourage our residents to shop locally, we certainly know that we have some prolific online shoppers here in Yellowknife and throughout the north, and Canada Post has been a big part of delivering the goods when people are making those orders.
Regarding some of the specific options that the committee is examining, I think it came up in the last panel as well, but community mailbox conversion is not an issue that's particularly relevant for Yellowknifers or northerners in general. We've been on that model of service for quite some time. While I understand it's a somewhat controversial issue in other regions of the country, as I said, it's not particularly relevant for us here in the north.
I hope the committee members have a chance to visit our post office here in Yellowknife. It really has been a community hub for a long time. While the building was sold a few years ago by the Government of Canada, it remains a central focal point of our downtown core. Activities and public events happen there throughout the year. There are many events that are hosted there, as that central point where our community can come together.
I'd also say that Canada Post here in Yellowknife, and in many other communities across the north, provides steady, well-paying jobs to our residents. That's an important component in contributing to the local economy. We know that the public sector is a large part of the overall economy in many northern communities, and Canada Post has certainly contributed to that.
I'll finish up by touching briefly on the issue of postal banking, which is something that I think the committee has been examining to some degree. I do think there's merit in a more detailed examination of a postal banking model, particularly for northern communities, many of which lack any form of brick-and-mortar financial services. I think there may be some opportunities—if Canada Post is looking at not only the expenditure side of its budget but the revenue side of its budget—to consider evolving that national mission that it first started with, and potentially look at the option of providing financial services in communities that either don't have those services in the first place or are looking at serving that population that is not being served by the current banking system. I do think, probably beyond the scope of what this committee is able to do and the time allotted to it, that there is merit in a more detailed examination of that potential model of service provision in many communities across the country.
I'll stop there. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.