First, I want tell you that I usually sit on the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage. I am the Bloc Québécois heritage critic. It's strange for me to sit here on the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology.
However, you must understand that the Quebec cultural world is very concerned about foreign ownership in telecommunications. In fact, everyone in the cultural field to whom I've spoken in Quebec tells me that telecommunications and broadcasting are the same. There's no doubt on that score. A number of people are even asking that the two acts, telecommunications and broadcasting, be merged because you can't tell the difference between the two.
Even Mr. Wilson, who wrote the report that has brought us here today and who submitted it two years ago, said it was very difficult to tell the difference even then. In spite of everything, he recommended just opening up telecommunications, not broadcasting. The industry department representatives come here and tell us they'll just be handling telecommunications, not broadcasting. That's impossible. In any case, I don't understand that.
Our colleague, Mr. Garneau, for whom I have a considerable degree of respect—I find him intelligent, brilliant—said he was pleased that they were handling only telecommunications.
I have a host of examples. The example I usually give everyone is wireless. It's considered a telecommunications business, in the Government of Canada's view. And yet we see that they make major cultural choices. They influence consumers in their cultural choices. By offering 16 applications, virtually half of which are American... This example concerns English Canada, but I figure that, if those applications were sold in Quebec, there would be no Scotiabank, but I imagine there would be the Mouvement Desjardins; there wouldn't be any MacLean's magazine, but there would be L'actualité and Le Journal de Montréal. In any case, they make cultural choices that influence consumers from a cultural standpoint.
Have you observed the same thing? And how can you cite examples in your field, and attest to them, to convince the other people around the table who are not yet convinced?