Government Operations committee  Overall, I would say yes. In fact, I would have liked to see an effort to quantify some of the pricing strategy, for example, and a review of labour and pension costs. A series of other things have been mentioned, but I think that's something that could be beefed up, so to speak.

Government Operations committee  Yes, in fact, the volume of activity, the price, the cost structure that was—

Government Operations committee  I can't suggest that, because I haven't done the actual math behind it, and that's not my role. My role is just to take from the analysis—

Government Operations committee  I'm just saying this is the elephant in the room. If you change that—the break they have right now, the deferral—that would change the nature of the whole financial sustainability of Canada Post for sure.

Government Operations committee  These rules exist for a reason.

Government Operations committee  The short answer is that there were some changes implemented by Canada Post, so that what we anticipated for 2020 wouldn't be the outcome. There was a postal transformation process with incremental changes—the community mailbox, for example. Some of the scenarios, in fact, that were put forward, in terms of the analysis we did in 2013, have been put in place.

Government Operations committee  Exactly. The price increase, labour, service, community mailbox—all those things were measured as part of the scenario.

Government Operations committee  Yes, and I think the big elephant in the room is the pension issue, something that we had put aside assuming that it could be solved somehow, but it's going to have to be dealt with.

Government Operations committee  The full transfer—

Government Operations committee  No. Actually, in the six scenarios we put forward around the wage, that was unrealistic. It was just to indicate the magnitude of the challenge. With regard to alternate-day delivery, I know Ernst & Young came out with saying that there would a small potential gain from that. I understand it's linked to the core infrastructure requirement and fixed-cost nature of the business.

Government Operations committee  The challenge in that type of exercise is always to establish an order of magnitude since there are a lot of potential solutions. Here we have six scenarios, and none of them managed to fill the financial gap. We realize we have to take a broader view. There is a range of initiatives to consider.

Government Operations committee  Our first observation is that the challenge is enormous. Changes are being made to the business model, which, as I mentioned earlier, promotes efficiency gains while maintaining service. Then it remains to be seen what service Canadians expect and how to adjust the business model to provide that service.

Government Operations committee  The 2013 year was the second year in which Canada Post incurred an operating loss. In the basic scenario that we had prepared at the time, including changes planned as part of the so-called postal transformation initiative implemented by Canada Post, the corporation posted a profit.

Government Operations committee  We did not make any comparisons of its cost structure with those of other postal services.

Government Operations committee  In fact—