Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon, everybody. I don't have a question, but I do have a couple of comments. I want to thank you all for coming, you and the previous panel. We've been hearing stories, very heart-wrenching stories, for the last few months, and it is regrettable. I want to apologize to all of you. It's a very serious matter that needs to be addressed and acted upon very quickly.
Unfortunately, we spend a lot of time arguing over whether there are 400 of you or 200,000 of you. As far as I'm concerned, I don't care if there are only five of you; this issue needs to be addressed quickly.
If you'll allow me to be partisan here, I was disappointed that the government spent a lot of time trying to draft frivolous legislation on exotic dancers instead of drafting legislation to fix this. We've been hearing this issue for the last three or four months, and this committee has been trying to keep this issue at the forefront and hopefully put pressure on the government to act quickly. I know your testimony here today will accelerate that and will help us get that job done.
I want to apologize again for what you're going through. It is regrettable. I hope we can get it fixed quickly.
Thank you.