Mr. Speaker, I will start by thanking my hon. colleague from Jonquière for her question.
I will try to put in simple terms a somewhat complex legal concept. The offence of insider trading is designed to prevent someone who is privy to information he or she would not have access to if it were not for the position he or she is holding in a company, for instance, from using this information to make money for themselves or someone close to them on the financial markets.
We can think of the head of a mining company, for example, who is aware of a new development that will increase the value of the said company and uses this information, perhaps communicating it to someone else so that this person may make money outside what is prescribed in the regulations on the securities market.
The idea is to create a level playing field and to ensure that no one can take advantage of his or her position in an organization to get rich at the expense of ordinary people.