Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Burlington for that question because I think it concerns every member of the House as to the future of small business.
We have undertaken several initiatives in the last nine months which will become public in the next few weeks. Everyone will see the hard work that has been done. For example, the Department of Industry and the Department of Finance have been working through a private business community group to come up with a number of suggestions for financing. The House of Commons committee on industry will have its report out in the next few weeks on the future of financing those small businesses.
The government has been working very hard to convince the banks to make their lending procedures with small businesses more transparent. We expect to see a new code of conduct become public.