Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Terrebonne for his questions. First, as regards the public service, the minister and the committee insisted on some form of co-operation between the unions and the government concerning substitution, that is that the retirement arrangement must be accepted by individual public servants. Perhaps, and I hope so, in the next three years, all government retirees will follow the course of substitution making use of the generous benefits offered by the government.
Secondly, as concerns national standards in education, neither our committee, nor the minister nor the budget will require national standards in education. This is surely part of the negotiations undertaken by the Minister of Human Resources Development.
In listening to all the witnesses, we were very grateful to a group that suggested the standards in the area of education be not national, but international, standards of knowledge and excellence, given the area is a competitive one.
And we, like all Canadians, in Quebec, in British Columbia or in any province or territory, must take international competition and our own system of education across Canada into account, if we are really to take advantage of it.