Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, all three of you, for your presentations here today.
We're talking about the capstone, an agency that's being created to deal with the tri-council, the three federal research funding councils. I think the challenge that we have is the perception, from the witnesses we've heard, that the capstone is going to have a whole bunch more money to give out to people, because researchers come for money. That's what they need. Having been one in the past, I can say that you need that to survive.
It's so great to hear from all of you, in particular when we talk about the polytechnics etc., all across the country that do tremendous work with businesses, and that trickle-down effect to communities gets the research that is dealing with things like boots on the ground.
At Southeast College in my hometown, Tania Andrist, educational director for innovation and applied research, is looking at things such as carbon capture, which are great research projects. However, as we heard from my colleague, our concern is that, while you have all these research projects, they're not touching things like that, which are so important.
The challenge is how to ensure that the colleges are getting that. You mentioned that only 2.9% of funding is going to colleges. I think the job should be done by the tri-council; the tri-council should be accountable for where that funding is going. Rather than creating a whole new bureaucracy, let's get the tri-council to actually do the part that the capstone is being proposed for.
Ms. Watts-Rynard, do you have any thoughts on that?