Thank you, Mr. Chair.
And thank you to our guests for your work today.
Ms. Cheng, I want to join my colleague Mr. Albas in commenting briefly on the clean opinion you've been referring to, and send our congratulations to those people behind the scenes who do all the hard work to get it to that level so that when you go in with an audit team, you have good data, good information to work with. Please extend our thanks to them as well.
I want to begin by talking about the results posted in this report. The public accounts state that the Canadian economy posted modest growth over the course of 2012 and in the first half of 2013, and that Canada recorded one of the best performances among G-7 countries.
Can you comment on what factors contributed to that growth, and perhaps provide some personal opinion?
Mr. Ralston, I will start with you, and then whoever of your colleagues would like to join in.