Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome to Canada and welcome to the committee. I have just a couple of comments to pass on to you. I know your economy has been doing incredibly well lately. We've had 10 years of prosperity here in Canada, which has taken us to the point now where we're balancing our budget, interest rates are low, and unemployment is at a 30-year low. I'm from western Canada, Vancouver, and the economy in British Columbia is booming, as is Alberta's.
One of the interesting things you said in your opening comments was that your need for immigrants is urgent and your population is aging rapidly. That is one of the things that as a committee we've also discussed. I think it's a global problem with developed countries. We've got an aging population that will be retiring soon, between about 2012 and 2015.
One of the things Canada has is a great competitive advantage, vis-à-vis your country and other countries in the world, in accepting immigrants and assimilating them peacefully into our society. I don't think Canadians really appreciate the fact that we're world leaders in opening our doors to people, and we have such great success stories of people who have come here, even recently. In the next five or ten years, I think Canada is going to realize how great a competitive advantage we have.
I think we have that advantage because it's been our history. Canada is a young country compared to a lot of the countries of Europe, and we were forged out of the fact that we had English- and French-speaking people coming together, and we had a large first nations aboriginal population to begin with. So the way Canada started to grow was due to three distinct societies having to get along with each other. I think the level of mutual respect and tolerance is part of being Canadian. We've been able to take that and evolve that forward, and now I believe we celebrate the differences between ethnic groups and members of society.
I know that in Vancouver, where I come from, you can walk down the streets, and every ethnicity in the world is prevalent there and growing. We also have the luxury of having lots of real estate. We have lots of areas to take in people and grow, so we're not like smaller countries, where you really have to figure out how to maximize the efficiency of your area.
Those are just some of the comments I wanted to pass on to you to show how our society is structured. I think that's what benefits us on the immigration front.