Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm delighted to be with you again at this committee.
On a personal note, I spoke yesterday to Tom Lukiwski. I had given him a call last week to check in, and we had a nice conversation yesterday. He assures me that he looks forward to returning. He's having a good recovery. I know we all feel the same way, that we wish him godspeed in his recovery and look forward to seeing him back in this place.
Madam Chair, it's great to see you here today. I'm delighted to be joined here today by Joyce Murray, our parliamentary secretary; Yaprak Baltacioglu, the secretary of the Treasury Board of Canada; Renée LaFontaine, the chief financial officer; Marcia Santiago, the executive director of the expenditure management sector; and Brian Pagan, who is not just the assistant secretary of the expenditure management sector but also the president of the Ottawa Senators fan club.
We have wonderful public servants in the Government of Canada, and we have some really great ones at Treasury Board, but I wanted to dissuade you from any notion that they're just a bunch of boring bean-counters, because they are living, breathing sports fans who feel quite passionately about other things besides budget and estimates processes.
Madam Chair, I'm pleased to be here with members of the committee to discuss the 2017-18 main estimates.
I've had the pleasure of appearing before this committee a number of times in my role as President of the Treasury Board and, as you have commented before, I feel like an honorary member. More than that, I value the hard work that goes on here because it is important to the sound finances of the country.
As you know, on February 23, the Government of Canada tabled its 2017-18 main estimates. These main estimates provide—