Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to our witnesses from coast to coast.
My question will be for Ms. Fenn mostly, because as a proud MP from the Hamilton area I've seen the success of HOPA on many levels.
You talked about Hamilton, Oshawa and Niagara, because this is about the Great Lakes, not just the Hamilton port. I'm encouraged to hear now about Sault Ste. Marie, because of course the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence Seaway are Canada's fourth coast, which we always forget about, yet it means billions of dollars for the southern Ontario economy.
In the budget, there was an announcement of the CBSA facility that, after many years, is finally going to happen. Despite that, as a very simple and small ask, I'd suggest that HOPA has actually been successful in spite of the federal government, and here is why I think that. We had the national supply chain task force summit back in 2022, which had on it leading experts from across the country. The final report of that supply chain task force had eight immediate recommendations and 13 medium-term recommendations. Not all of those are done, and it's been some years now. Then, of course, we had Bill C-33, the strengthening ports bill, which was introduced in 2022 by a minister now five times removed. It died on the Order Paper when the Prime Minister called the election in 2025. Perhaps that's a good thing, because frankly the bill was woefully inadequate. We've had some discussions on that at this committee. What preceded that bill were seven years of consultation.
As well, this committee did a study on port infrastructure. We visited ports from coast to coast and tabled a report. In fact, we were in Hamilton to see the great works there.
There have been at least five years of talking and good intentions, but nothing to show for it. Is it fair to say that there's been a lot of talk and really no action?