Transport committee  In fact, we have already observed that these choices make a large difference in the prices paid by Canadian and American consumers. The sums required by airline carriers—

Transport committee  Airport taxes, surcharges and other things of that type can contribute to increasing the cost of an airline ticket by 20%, 30% or 40%. These are very important elements.

Transport committee  Obviously, air and the north are great priorities to start with. I think the report, as a starting point, whatever one's views of the recommendations are, should provide the government with a road map to the challenges that stakeholders have identified. We tried through our work, in particular, as a result of the experience that our chair Mr.

Transport committee  No, that's fine. I understand French.

Transport committee  Sure.

Transport committee  The main challenge for the carriers that provide service in the Far North is, as you indicated, the small number of passengers and the amount of business they do. Some countries like the United States, Russia, and certain others, have overcome this problem thanks to programs that were specifically—

Transport committee  Yes. They were designed for the needs of remote areas. But the United States, for instance, has areas that are not as remote as ours.

Transport committee  That's correct. There is a community that is quite close to the Ontario border and has been designated as a remote community. Consequently, it receives subsidies. The cost of air transport is so high in some communities that the American government decided to grant subsidies so that prices would not be as high.

Transport committee  That's an excellent question, and it was one that we struggled with as a panel. One of the elements I should note in this is that if foreign ownership increases to 49%, it doesn't necessarily mean increased foreign airline competition in Canada. It merely allows carriers, or airlines, or air services companies to access a greater pool of capital, which, unfortunately, in a country of this size isn't as large as a lot of these start-ups would like it to be.

Transport committee  In terms of the north?

Transport committee  In northern Canada you presently have two large carriers operating throughout the north, and smaller regional carriers operating to and from smaller communities. They play a vital role in northern transportation. Road and rail north of the 60th parallel, and to most of that territory, aren't viable alternatives because of the cost and the distances involved.

Transport committee  We certainly encountered this very issue that you raise when we were out consulting various stakeholders, and quite a few of them mentioned the fact that the last time they had had input, or their organizations had had input in this type of a consultation, was actually more than 10 years ago—it was about 13 years ago—and so much had changed.

Transport committee  Yes. We consulted quite widely, both in Canada and the U.S., and to a lesser degree in Mexico, where we sought best practices; we looked at ways in which the integration of the continent has taken place, and how we could best position Canada in light of that integration. One of the fascinating things that we encountered, for example, was the movement of goods.

Transport committee  Absolutely. Let me just start by saying that our initial assumption was that we wouldn't be touching too much on infrastructure, because that would have been outside the scope of transportation. However, as we delved more deeply into this and looked at what other jurisdictions have done in their management of transportation policy, infrastructure was very much a part of how they positioned themselves.

Transport committee  Thank you, Madam Chair, for the invitation to appear before you today. I know you had invited the former chair of the CTA review panel, the Honourable David Emerson, to appear before you, but unfortunately he was unable to attend. I'll certainly do my best to represent him and the rest of the panel members at today's meeting.