Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
My question today is for Mr. Frise.
I want to say how pleased I am to have you here today. With all the work I've done with the auto industry in the last four years, I've been very impressed with AUTO21 and your leadership in AUTO21. We hear a lot about commercialization and innovation, but from the statistics I have on the number of research projects you're doing and the actual patents and copyrights you've filed, you're actually doing it. As an example for other institutions, you're getting the job done.
In your opinion, how can Canada develop a culture of innovation? When you're answering, I'd like you to take a couple of things into account. We've heard about intellectual property. Could you comment on federal scientists working in federal labs? If they're doing research and they come up with an innovative project, who should control the IP? Sometimes it's 100% government, sometimes it's 100% scientists, and sometimes it's 50-50.
In our last budget we brought up $250 million for the automotive innovation fund. Are we on the right track? You mentioned how other countries in Europe do it. Could you give us a comment? We really want to put in policies that are going to get the job done even better than we're doing now.