I'll start. That's a great question.
First, most of what we export, as I mentioned, is manufactured goods, but a lot of the manufactured goods are production parts or subcomponents, whether in food, auto, aerospace, computer parts, machinery, you name it. It doesn't matter. That's the vast majority of what Canada imports and exports, production parts.
Mostly, what happens is that the small companies are a tier three shipping to a tier two. The tier two ships to a tier one, and the tier one to the OEM. The small companies aren't directly exporting. In fact, if you ask them if they are exporting, they would say, “No, I'm selling to Jimmy, down the street. That's who I sell to.” They don't even know where their stuff ends up, in most cases. The big companies are the ones....
When we talk about border trade facilitation, it impacts the entire supply chain, from the GM in Oshawa right down to Linamar in Guelph, where I live, or to a smaller person in that automotive supply chain, which has crossed the Ambassador Bridge. It impacts them all, but it's mostly the larger companies, which know about the problems, that have responsibility.
I came before this committee in the spring to talk about NAFTA modernization. The number one priority we heard from our members—big or small, it didn't matter—was to simplify the border, get rid of the red tape, and make it easier. It's not about security. It's about making sure that people understand the processes and can submit information electronically.
Here we are, talking about electronic commerce. You can't submit information to the Government of Canada electronically if you are moving stuff across the border, in most cases. You can't do it. The government can't accept it, and if it can accept it, chances are it's backed up by a hard copy afterwards, on paper. With NAFTA rules of origin, you have to have an original signature on that certificate to prove that it is the right product.
There are a lot of things the Government of Canada could do to make it easier, and those are the things that we are talking to negotiators about, in terms of simplifying it and making it easier for a company of any size, because it is critical. It's the number one issue that companies face.