Thank you very much. I have just three quick points.
First of all, to Mr. Fillmore's comments, to review this decision by committee was not a hasty decision. Parliament should have been sitting some time ago. We have another week coming up that is empty of meetings for our committee, so it makes sense for us to do some useful work there. I would highlight and restate that this is a Canadian mining company. The notion that this has a tenuous connection to Canada and that somehow this is dubious is just false.
Mr. Fillmore, I want to assure you that we are fully committed to working collaboratively with the chair, with you and with your colleagues all around the table. The fact that we brought forward this proposed study should not in any way be taken as somehow disrupting that collaboration and collegiality around the table. I think you would admit that.
I would direct your attention, members and colleagues, to the website itself. We're not experts in lithium. I doubt that the minister is an expert in lithium, although my Liberal friends are asserting that somehow this lithium—nothing to see here—has no impact at all on our battery and EV ecosystem.
Here's what the Neo Lithium website actually says:
We are on the cusp of a global energy transformation on the back of the lithium-ion battery technology. In the near future, the lithium industry will face the challenge to increase production to meet the demand required for the electrification of transportation. Neo Lithium's 3Q Project is the pre-eminent lithium brine asset in the world to meet this demand.
Folks, let's not be under the illusion that our Chinese friends are interested in this company because somehow they like lithium carbonate and it's a product that has no significant role to play in the global economy. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I have a final comment.
Mr. Erskine-Smith, our role as a committee is not simply to hear the minister's explanation and then rubber-stamp it. We, as committee members, have a role to play, and it is oversight—to scrutinize the decisions and the actions of government. That's what we're doing with these proposed meetings. We want to scrutinize this decision because, I believe, it's a very important one. The facts that we are now disputing here can easily be clarified if we hold a number of meetings to discuss this. It's a reasonable request from a reasonable opposition.
I would ask all of you to support us in moving ahead with this. Let's make the coming week productive.