Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you for joining us today.
I'd like to welcome our Minister of Natural Resources. Thank you, sir, for joining us today. I know this is the first opportunity you've had to come and speak to us since you've assumed this position. We are very grateful for that. I know you've expressed an interest since the summer in coming to talk to us. Our schedule and your schedule make it difficult sometimes to make that happen. On behalf of the committee, I'd like to express our gratitude.
One thing about this committee is that we are very proud of the fact that we are collegial. We get along well. We work well together. We identify issues that we have in common and solutions that we like to work towards together. That is going to be the prevailing theme today, I believe, on both sides of the table, which I would like to emphasize.
You know the process. We certainly don't need to explain that to you, sir.
I'm going to open the floor to you now and then we will get to questions after that.
Thank you.