Thank you, Mr. Chair. I will share my time with Mr. Sullivan.
Let's go back to the idea of competition. Correct me if I am wrong, but I get the impression that two things are being confused. There seems to be an assumption that there is a direct link between whether the tendering process is open or closed and whether there is competition or not. In other words, if the process is closed, the competition will magically disappear.
In addition, a number of witnesses have told us that that makes prices go up, by 2% to 40%, which may well create problems with meeting deadlines. However, those are still very vague estimates.
Can you back up your statements with studies, empirical data that can be extrapolated to the whole country and that would allow us to compare the level of competition in the two processes? If not, the real issue is still a moral issue and we will come back to it. However, do we have empirical data to back that up?
The question goes to everyone.