I now declare this 86th meeting of the public accounts committee of the House of Commons to order.
On your behalf, colleagues, I welcome our guests today. We have quite a few affected by this chapter. They were good enough to be here, and we appreciate that.
First off, on behalf of all the members, may I extend our apologies. We had a ruling from the Speaker, followed by a vote, all of which had to happen before we could leave the chamber. Our apologies for keeping you waiting.
Unless there are any interventions to the contrary, we will begin with our usual procedures.
Just going by the order that's on my paper here, we'll start with the Auditor General's opening remarks. Then we'll move to Mr. Guimont. Then we'll move to the Treasury Board, to Communications Security Establishment Canada, and last but not least, to Shared Services Canada. Following that, we will begin the usual rotation. My sense is that we should be okay time-wise, but we'll continue to monitor that as we go through.
Unless there are concerns or questions to the contrary, I will now call on Mr. Ferguson, the Auditor General of Canada, to begin his opening remarks.
Mr. Ferguson, you have the floor, sir.