Thank you very much.
Please forgive me for being late. The printing presses are running today at our small newspaper.
My sister and I own three newspapers. I am 43. We are young businesswomen. Our newspapers are distributed in the Outaouais region.
We have the Pontiac Journal; the West Quebec Post, which was established in 1896; and the Bulletin d'Aylmer.
We serve a community that's both rural and urban in minority language situations. We have readerships who live in English, residing in Quebec. We send reporters to French events, cover them, and we publish the news in English so that residents who live in Quebec but don't understand French well have the news. They know what bylaws are being changed.
In my newsroom, we're facing an increasingly diminished ability to do research journalism and cover city council, municipal council, and regional council, let alone any other news that comes our way. Increasingly we're doing—us, as owners—extra time, overtime, before work and after work. We're writing and reporting because we can't afford to staff our newsrooms.
I'm aware that you have the brief that was submitted to the minister in October. The action plans detailed in that brief are at the core of what we do, and any actions that are taken to support those action plans will make a difference to English speakers in Quebec living in a minority-language situation. I understand that everyone has that at the core of why we're here today.
I really thank you, and I'm open to any questions you have.