You must have been watching CBC.
I have a basic question, and I really appreciate the discussion today. It's been absolutely excellent in presenting the different points of view; however, I'm of the view that Canada can't operate in a cocoon. Things are happening around the world in all industries, including the telecommunications industry, in terms of competition, consolidations, and those types of things. My concern today is that if we do not move to be more competitive in the world market in terms of opening up to foreign investment, the companies that are here today just will not survive in the long term because they won't be able to attract the capital to be able to compete. We have a small market to begin with, as you've mentioned.
I'm offering you an opportunity to make an academic response to that view. Do you believe that in the long term, preventing more foreign ownership would have an effect on the ability of existing Canadian companies to survive? If you believe, as I think Mr. Paradis does, that they could survive, how do we encourage Canadians to invest in their own companies? What are we doing wrong? Are the companies doing something wrong? What could the government be doing?
I come from Burlington, Ontario. Steel was a big issue in my area. We had Dofasco and Stelco. I'll use Dofasco as an example. It is now owned by a foreign entity. It was an excellent steel company and still is an excellent steel company, but it waited around, and as consolidations happened around the world, it got swallowed. The alternative was to be more proactive, in my view. That's what I'm concerned about in the telecommunications business.
I'll leave it to you to comment. Mr. Paradis, you can go first, and then we'll go down the line if anybody else wants to comment.