Welcome, everyone. I'd like to call the meeting to order.
As per the orders of the day, today we'll begin with Bill C-308, An Act to amend the Employment Insurance Act (improvement of the employment insurance system). We'll have the sponsor of the bill, Monsieur Lessard, testifying for the first hour.
I suggest--and I already spoke with Monsieur Lessard about this--that because we have votes today, we'll have to complete the entire committee meeting today by 5:15 p.m. We do have a little bit of committee business to look at, which means we have to complete the witness portion by 5:00. Therefore, Monsieur Lessard has agreed that he will take 45 minutes for his introduction and the questions from us. That will give his witnesses a little more time, and we can also do the committee business. He's agreed, so we'll move forward with that.
Monsieur Lessard, welcome today as witness as opposed to someone asking the questions. We look forward to hearing from you. You will have 10 minutes to present, and then we will begin our first round of questions.
Monsieur Lessard, I turn the mike over to you.