Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I also want to welcome you to the committee and thank you, Mr. Minister, for being here today.
We talk about a lot of things that happen, and one of them that is obviously important is the budget, the budget that came out on May 2. It resonated well, I think, across this country in all areas. But since we're talking about manufacturing and research and development, I think certainly with business and universities in research and development it's been positive.
There have been some comments, one actually that came from the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. Those are companies that employ the majority of our citizens in this country, and they said, “This budget exceeds our expectations”; and then it ends by saying that it would be great if all the political parties in this minority government could support these initiatives.
This next comment is from the president of the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada: “We are pleased with the budget's support for university research, as well as the government's recognition of the important role that research plays for Canadians.” The president said: “These increases in research funding underline the government's commitment to promote a more competitive, more productive Canadian economy.”
I think those are fairly strong words that we would hear. And then we have the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, whose president, Perrin Beatty, said, “This is encouraging--a better budget for business than we have seen in the last five years.” .
Those are coming from fairly significant individuals, who are well recognized, and companies or associations of credibility. I'm wondering if you were not just to take those comments at par value maybe, but rather, I wonder if you could take those and expand somewhat on what actually they mean for Canadians and what value that actually means for Canadians.