Industry committee  The minister has met with a number of leaders in the auto sector, both the assemblers as well as parts...to get additional insights. I've spent some time with General Motors, Ford, and so forth, because we recognize that auto is a very important part of our national economy and it is very much one that we focus on.

Industry committee  As I read Minister Flaherty's and Minister's Baird's remarks with regard to the process the government went through and the results they achieved, I think if I compare what you said to what Ministers Flaherty and Baird described, one could see a dovetailing of intentions.

Industry committee  No. There is perhaps $1 million, which, in the grand scheme of things.... It's a revolving fund. To go back to your house, you want to have some money set aside just in case your roof starts leaking. So there is a need to not totally empty the revolving fund, because that would not be fair to the users who have paid into this.

Industry committee  Yes, that is what management is very much focused on in order to provide value-for-money service to the people who are paying for this service.

Industry committee  I guess the safe response would be no, but let me expand. The department is involved in reviewing a number of science and technology aspects. We have this huge chart in the office dealing with the government's science and technology ecosystem, which covers a wide range of initiatives, ranging from the granting councils to what we do through the Canada Foundation for Innovation, Genome Canada, and so forth.

Industry committee  What do you mean by removing? What are we removing?

Industry committee  As I was saying, there is still a fair amount of money left. There is other capital, venture capital. If you look at it in terms of the Canadian market, we are trying to work with provinces on the internal market, because many people have told us that it's much harder to send something from Halifax to Montreal to Toronto than it is to....

Industry committee  A point of clarification and then a comment. I thank you for the recent designation/appointment that puts me in charge of tourism in the country.

Industry committee  Tourism is a highly atomized sector in terms of the number of people--officials and industry people--who are involved in this sector. So I just give the caveat that it's not totally accurate to deem me the Canadian czar of tourism.

Industry committee  With regard to the federal government, as I said, we are quite cognizant of the importance of...and as I said, I have spent some time with both the chair and the president. I intend to meet with them again next month, and to follow that up with a series of other meetings with a view toward enhancing the role of tourism.

Industry committee  I believe fiscal issues are those that fall within the parameters of political ministerial decision-making.

Industry committee  I would like to rephrase that somewhat. There is due diligence done on projects; there's very careful scrutiny of the business case of the proposal. I would not want to offer a blank endorsement that anybody who submitted any project is going to be endorsed. But as I believe the minister said yesterday in the House, this year's financial envelope will be a bit south of $300 million, which is a fair amount of money.

Industry committee  I'm given to understand that a number was identified. A Treasury Board submission went, and they received authorization to spend up to $25 million. It ended up costing about $19 million and change.

Industry committee  What I've described to you is how the case was developed. They had $25 million. Now, it is fair to say that the CTC would have preferred to retain that excess relocation money, as any agency that has a mandate in law to pursue certain goals would have preferred having probably the $5.6 million or $5.7 million retained within its budget, within its base, to do additional initiatives.

Industry committee  The efficiency resulted from conversations that were held with the chief statistician, who, in recognition of the government's desire to reduce expenditures, reviewed what was going on in Statistics Canada and identified areas where expenditures could either be postponed or curtailed.