Finance committee  I've certainly been here for many Liberal filibusters when they have gone on wild tangents—

Finance committee  Would I be accurate in saying that this perhaps points to a more systemic issue? I'm sorry. Is my time over?

Finance committee  Thank you very much. I wanted to clarify on the food, because I don't know if the viewers would have a clear idea about it. I'll quote from Monsieur Charlebois's article. He said, “Over the next few weeks, the database containing the average prices of 52 products sold in Canadian grocery stores will be completely removed by Statistics Canada.”

Finance committee  So that's incorrect.

Finance committee  Okay. Will you be updating that database from this point forward?

Finance committee  Thank you for that. I'm not in any way meaning to criticize the new series, but the old series will not be updated. Is that correct?

Finance committee  You could have two different streams, though, and my understanding is that's what they've done in the United States on similar food tables. It is possible to have those two sets, and this would give us some better historical data in the times when we're experiencing historical food prices.

Finance committee  Clearly, though, you have the food table for a reason.

Finance committee  Not the aggregate, but if you're looking for a particular commodity in a time when those food prices are going up, taking the data off would not, I think, at least from this observer, be a great way to go. When we look at inflation, you note a couple of things that have decreased, including car insurance, but overall, through the vast majority of the categories, we're seeing increases in prices.

Finance committee  Yes, I'm aware of that. I'm asking you, though, to break—

Finance committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm going to borrow heavily from a friend of our finance committee, Professor Sylvain Charlebois. He has written a recent article in which he states that the StatsCan website will be refreshing or creating a brand new database regarding the price of food.

Finance committee  My understanding is that you're actually going to be eliminating from the website, for public consumption, the 25 years of data that has been collected, meaning you will no longer be able to do year over year studies. It seems like a bit of an odd time to [Technical difficulty—Editor] and food prices.

Finance committee  It said your website “posted a note to readers at the very bottom of its monthly Consumer Price Index report” that it would be removing this data. Is that not true?

Finance committee  You won't be able to compare the new data because it's a different grouping of foods or different types of foods from the old data.

Finance committee  No, that's fine. You will not be updating the old basket, which will eliminate the ability to do a year over year comparison at a time when we have the highest food prices. Is that right?