Thank you, Mr. Chair.
We met here today because of a motion, moved by my party, to address two important issues. The first is the government's decision on Globalive. The CRTC considered that Globalive does not have enough Canadian content, while the government took a different position. So I would certainly like to understand that better, but I will not ask you these questions myself because I hope to be able to bring them before the CRTC and, ideally, to address them to the minister later.
The other reason for our meeting today is to explore the issue of foreign ownership, and you talked about that in your speech.
There are a number of questions I would like to ask you concerning foreign ownership, because as you can appreciate, there are some very strong opinions being expressed across the spectrum on this particular issue.
The first question I would like to ask you goes to the reason for which foreign ownership restrictions were put in place in the first place. Let me quote the main objectives of the Canadian telecommunications policy: it's the maintenance of Canada's identity and sovereignty. I think it's important to review whether the arguments that were put in place when the act was written still apply today. I think that's a very valid exercise.
I would like to have your opinion, as it applies only to the Telecommunications Act, on whether, if we were to increase allowable foreign ownership in the telecommunications sector, there is the potential to have an impact on our identity and sovereignty.