Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, we made a real commitment to being open and transparent. We made a commitment to listening to Canadians. One of our very first initiatives in that regard was ensuring we had a pre-budget consultation process that was as open as possible.
We travelled across the country. We went to cities from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific coast and right up to the North. We went to rural communities and urban communities to listen to Canadians. So far, more than 150,000 Canadians have engaged with us online and we have more than 3,500 submissions, which is almost triple the number that were received last year.
We feel this enables us to get a good sense of what Canadians understand, to listen to what they believe we should do, and to incorporate their thoughts and views as we create budget 2016.