Good afternoon, colleagues and ministers. I will call this meeting to order.
Colleagues, I think most of you by now know the drill at these meetings, so we don't have to go over it in great detail, but I will advise all of our witnesses, including the ministers.
When you are making your statements, I would ask that if you begin your statement or question in one official language, please keep speaking in that official language and do not alternate between English and French. This would be of great assistance to our interpreters.
Second, for those of you who may be asked by the minister to answer a specific question, if you have the earbud type of microphone, please make sure you keep that type of microphone within one or two inches of your mouth so that our interpreters can hear your audio levels as best as possible.
Finally, colleagues, since this is the third time that Minister Anand has appeared before this committee in the last two or three months, I would like to go to questions as quickly as possible. I would, therefore, ask for consent for the following motion:
That the speaking notes presented by the Minister of Public Services and Procurement Canada be taken as read and appended to the evidence of today's meeting.
That would allow us to go directly into questions. Do I have consent from colleagues to accept that motion?
(Motion agreed to)
[See appendix—Remarks by Hon. Anita Anand]
We will start with a six-minute round of interventions, beginning with Mr. McCauley for six minutes.
