Thank you, Mr. Rickford, for being here.
I had the opportunity in the fall to travel to Washington with the International Trade Minister, and with Mr. Hoback from the Conservative Party, and with Mr. Lemire from the Bloc Québécois. We were there to talk to American legislators about an electric vehicle rebate and its potential impact on Canada.
As part of that conversation we were also talking about Canada's role to play in providing critical minerals for the EV market. One of the things that really stood out to me in the course of that lobbying effort was how detrimental it is to Canada's interest not to have a real strategy. When we talk to our American counterparts there is no document that we can use to show them not only the place that Canada can play in their own strategy, but how Canada sees them fitting into our strategy, whether it's for developing resources or manufacturing the cars of the future.
I think that ties in nicely to the questions that were rightly raised earlier around the role of China and Russia in this market. Again, if you treat every acquisition or every new development as a one-off, without taking a properly strategic approach, then it's a lot harder to get to where you want to go, and to protect Canada's national and security interests.
I just wonder if you have some reflections you'd care to share with the committee on whatever efforts are taking place to build a proper national strategy around critical minerals and the EV market that we might take to our allies in order to impress upon them the importance of continuing to work with Canada and ensuring that Canada is part of their plans as we go forward into a very different auto market into the future.