Good morning, everyone. I call the meeting to order.
Welcome to meeting number 31 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology. Today's meeting is taking place in a hybrid format pursuant to the House order of January 25. The proceedings will be made available via the House of Commons website, and as usual the webcast will only show the person speaking rather than the entire committee.
To ensure an orderly meeting, I'd like to outline a few rules to follow.
Members and witnesses, you may speak in the official language of your choice. Interpretation services are available for this meeting. You have the choice at the bottom of your screen of the floor, English or French. Please select your preference now.
As a reminder, all comments by members and witnesses should be addressed through the chair. Before speaking, please wait until I recognize you by name, and when you are not speaking, please make sure your microphone is on mute. For the purpose of interpretation, please do not speak over each other so that the interpreters can do their work. Most importantly, as is my normal practice, I will hold up a yellow card for when you have 30 seconds left in your intervention, and a red card when your time for questions has expired. Please keep your screen in gallery view so that you can see the cards when I hold them up, and please respect the time available so we can make sure that everyone has a chance to ask questions.
Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and the motion adopted by the committee on February 23, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology is meeting today to continue its study on competitiveness in Canada.
I'd now like to welcome our witnesses. Today we have Vass Bednar, executive director of the master of public policy in digital society program at McMaster University; Ritesh Kotak, technology entrepreneur and strategist; and Ellis Ross, member for Skeena in the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia. We also have, from the Canadian Media Concentration Research Project, Dwayne Winseck, director, Carleton University, and Ben Klass, senior research associate; and from the First Nations Tax Commission, C.T. (Manny) Jules, chief commissioner.
Welcome, everyone. Each witness will present for up to five minutes, to be followed by rounds of questions.
We will start with Vass Bednar. You have the floor for five minutes.