Thank you for your testimony and for coming in today. I think it's been very informative from the part of all witnesses.
Dr. Laslo-Baker, thank you also for mentioning the role of women entrepreneurs, because it's something that I hear a lot about in my own riding. In fact there are an increasing number of women entrepreneurs, and yet there are still challenges. You mentioned some of the challenges that I also hear echoes of in my own riding, so that's very important. You also mentioned the challenges of juggling family life and work life; they're not the same. I think something like looking into a national child care strategy would be something that we could find consensus on around the table.
I want to talk about something that Mr. Hodgson spoke about around, and this is a recurring theme in committee when we negotiate these free trade agreements. We have problems or challenges in making sure that SMEs can use these free trade agreements and turning SMEs into export champions. We know there are lots of barriers for SMEs. One barrier among many is the rules of origin regulations. I learned that many SMEs decide to pay the old tariff rates as opposed to taking advantage of the new tariff rates because of the enormous barrier this poses. There is also the question of intellectual property concerns and whether SMEs will have available, adequate resources to defend their own intellectual property.
Those are two barriers among many. Could you propose some solutions, or have you thought about some ways the federal government could remove those barriers?