Yes, a great deal of money. It is the Canadians who should have built that project. Canadians are the best downhill skiers, isn't that right? There is a lot that can be done over there.
They built a huge hotel in Abu Dhabi; I think it cost 2.5 or 3 billion dirhams. The hotel was built for the GCC conference that was held three or four years ago. There is a special entrance for the exclusive use of government representatives who attended the conference. That door has never been opened again since the conference ended. Other doors are open though. There are mountains of cash to spend. They have huge surpluses.
However, they are not very familiar with Canada. People with money invested it in the United States and in Europe. After September 11, the money flow changed direction and was invested in the Gulf, in Arab countries and in Africa. We have to capitalize on that so that Canadian companies will get these projects.
We can also encourage them to invest here. Canada is considered to be a peaceful country, where there is no conflict, a country which is neither imperialistic nor colonialistic. So why not encourage them to invest here in Canada? That would create jobs.
I will respond to your question, which dealt with how we might generate business here in Canada. It isn't up to me or to my colleagues to do that. It is up to the government, the Prime Minister, the minister, the governor general. They must encourage investment in Canada, which is a stable country. Even though there might be talk of dangerous political situations in the Gulf, the countries are relatively stable. There have been no problems there for some time now.
Egypt, for example, has only had three presidents in 50 years. It is an extremely stable country. Yes, it is a dictatorship, but that is part of the Arab mentality. They can't form the type of democracy that we are familiar with. The word “sultan” comes from the Arab word “sulta” which means power. The sultan holds the power in his hands. After thousands of years, they did try to change things. But it has never worked.
We have to invite them here and show them that Canada is ready to welcome them. If we open our doors to them they will invest here. They don't know Canada very well, and are unfamiliar with the type of tourist opportunities that we can provide. They could, for example, come here to ski, to see our autumn colours, and what we have to offer. We were able to do it with the Japanese. Why not try it with the Arabs? They are interested and they have money to spend. They travel first class, and that generates income for the airlines. They are interested in doing that type of thing.