Thank you, Madam Chair.
I want to thank my colleague from British Columbia as well. I am also from Vancouver, and I represent the riding of West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country.
Thank you both for joining us today.
The themes that you both raise are themes in which everyone in the room invests and cares about with passion—the long-term vision, Peter, and certainly the balance between security and freedom. I think everyone agrees that there are certain people who we don't want to invite to our borders.
Certainly, Peter, the notion of a gated community is beyond the imagination of our Conservative government, which this year has issued over 500,000 visas and in 2010 issued 920,000—a huge increase over the number of visas being issued by the previous Liberal administration.
This is a country that is catering to visitors, to tourists. Certainly we are very keen on foreign investment. Forbes magazine calls us the best place in the world to invest. In terms of immigration, 250,000 were welcomed to our shores from all over the world. So we're robustly welcoming the world, and the world is coming to our shores.
My first question is for Mr. Salter.
You asked whether we had a plan in terms of security and immigration. We do have biometrics, for instance. We have also centralized the process for obtaining information in all our foreign offices. Claims can now be processed wherever they are submitted. Do you encourage those measures? Do you feel that they will strengthen Canadian security? Do you have any other ideas for protecting us better?