First of all, the trade commissioner service is a very valued and independent operation, but it needs to be seen in conjunction with the work of our Canadian embassies abroad, which includes political reporting. Our political analysts are very important. If we have mining operations in countries that are dangerous for the Canadians working there, or if we have mining companies that are planning on investment in a country that is politically unstable, we need specialists who can talk about human rights violations in that country and who can assess for the Canadian government what the actions of Canadian companies are abroad.
Economic diplomacy is just one aspect of what we expect. We have immigration people who look at potential immigrants to Canada. We have development assistance people, people whose primary interest is increasing the capacity of countries to reduce poverty and to meet basic needs for education, health care, water, and so on. We've had programs of Canadians going abroad and of students from other countries coming to Canada. These require specialist people, specialists in their national development. It would be a huge mistake to throw away our political specialists, our immigration specialists, and our international development specialists and say that the only purpose of Canadian embassies abroad is to promote Canadian business. That's simply much too narrow and it's wrong, simply.