Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Good afternoon to everyone.
I'm very pleased to be back with the committee. I' m speaking to you from Sudbury. I am less than a kilometre away from Université Laurentienne, which I could also call, as Mr. Jolin did, Laurentian University. I will not go on at great length, as my good friend Darrell Samson used to do. He was in the habit of giving a long preamble and allowing only 50 seconds for the witness to answer his question. He was a past master at this. That being said, I really do want to get to the heart of the matter.
Mr. Jolin, you spoke about accountability. But after two years away from the committee, I can see that the problem persists. It's really a big challenge. As you know, the federal government transfers funds to the provinces, which do not want to be accountable to them at all. You also mentioned that provinces transfer funds to institutions. We might well ask about the institutions' accountability to the province.
Although I completely agree with you, I am wondering what option you might suggest to us. What I'm thinking about here are the recommendations we would have to make as part of this study. It's about the decline of French across Canada. I will of course speak to you about Laurentian University when I return, but for the time being, I'd like to know what option you would like to put forward with respect to accountability.