Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to the witnesses for being here.
I'm going to continue with Mr. Gervais, because that line of questioning was along the line of the one I want to go, especially if we are thinking that we don't have enough of a domestic market to warrant investment to do the production here and that we're going to export primarily to the United States. Do you have an idea of what percentage that would be?
I've been very lucky to have a committee that's been very gracious over the last number of weeks as my border has been under siege here in Windsor, Ontario, and I can't tell you what fallout from that is still happening right now. What's the point of trying to do some of this when we're utterly allowing our entry points to the United States to be destroyed right now? My concern is not just with regard to competing with the west and the east in terms of Europe and Asia, but also, right now, that we're undermining our market access to the United States.
For Mr. Gervais, and then for Mr. Billedeau, I'd like your comments on that, because I can tell you that some people think that while the border is open now, it was never really closed during COVID. There were actually 5,000 vehicles a day and 4,000 trucks that were always crossing. The only time it was closed during COVID was during the illegal blockade that took place. That is the only time the Ambassador Bridge basically shut down its portal.
We are building new capacity, but now I have Democrats and Republicans who are on the warpath to get rid of any type of potential expansion of investment in Canada. How do we deal with that? That's a very real thing that's taking place. You have legislation with Build Back Better, and now we have a whole bunch of motivated congressional and Senate people who are after that too. I'm trying to get some redundancy into the system with a truck ferry, but what do you think about the current risk that's going on?
We can talk about this, but putting out batteries and trying to ship them to Europe and China is not really our primary market. It's going to be the United States, but right now, if we don't do anything significant to protect our borders, decisions are being made, I can tell you that. I'm on the phone with them every day.
That's for Mr. Gervais first, and then Mr. Billedeau.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.