Order, please.
Welcome, Minister Bennett, and thank you very much for joining us today.
Joining the minister are her departmental officials: Françoise Ducros, senior assistant deputy minister of policy and strategic direction; Hélène Laurendeau, associate deputy minister; and Paul Thoppil, CFO of the department. Thanks very much for joining us.
The minister and departmental officials are here pursuant to the motion we adopted at committee on February 23, 2016, to invite her and hear about the mandate and supplementary estimates.
I'm going to take a moment to describe the flow of the meeting today.
We are going to begin with an opening statement from Minister Bennett that will cover both the mandate letter and the supplementary estimates. The remaining time in that first hour, up until 4:30, will be used for questions from committee members. We'll follow the speaking order and time allotments as illustrated in the routine motion.
At 4:30 I will suspend the meeting for a moment, people can have a breath and a glass of water, and we'll resume within a minute or two with questions on the supplementary estimates. At that point we will return to the top of the order and start again with the same speaking order and time allotments.
Without wasting anymore time, Minister Bennett, I invite you to please share your thoughts today.