International Trade committee  I have a very quick comment. Thank you. That gets to the heart of the “rotationality” of our officers abroad. Generally speaking, we have been focusing on geting people to extend a little bit longer, so that in what I would call the A markets--the U.S., Japan, and western Europ

International Trade committee  There might be several of us who get a chance to comment on this one. Clearly, both on the U.S. state level and on the Canadian provincial level, the whole idea of sub-nationals has been fraught with problems for some time. That said, we are making very strong representations at

International Trade committee  Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much for allowing us to have a few moments of your time. As the chair has mentioned, I'm joined by Stewart Beck. In the second phase, David Plunkett, who's behind me, will be discussing some of the bil

Foreign Affairs committee  I'm biased, but I'll tell you that Canada is the best. And it's partly because, as former chairs of the committee have said, Canada took up the CSR issue much earlier than a lot of other countries. We addressed it specifically. We have addressed it in terms of corruption. We move

Foreign Affairs committee  I'm not sure anybody wants to give you that answer on this end. Let me give you a personal observation, perhaps. I think Talisman as a company in Canada and worldwide today is a great example. Maybe they've learned through the school of hard knocks. I think Talisman, as the par

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. I'll take the first part of the question, which is on the UN Security Council. In my opening statement, I said that the government's position is clear, that they would follow and would welcome UN Security Council discussions, debate, and decisions on this one. The se

Foreign Affairs committee  I won't comment on that one, but I will ask my colleague to talk about Mr. Wilfert's question.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. The question is really around voluntary compliance. But it's also, I would argue, the case that Canadian companies, when they operate anywhere in the world, export Canadian values and Canadian systems. The number of Canadian companies that are ever involved in these i

Foreign Affairs committee  Mr. Chair, Mr. Dewar asks a difficult question to answer in any short version. But let me divide it into two. The first one is SEMA, and I think most of you have been through it in terms of Burma. We've used it in terms of Belarus; we've used it in other countries in the past.

Foreign Affairs committee  Thank you. Mr. Chair, with your permission, we will get back to you on that one, because it does take a little bit of analysis. I was just talking to Mr. Proudfoot from the Sudan Task Force. I think you deserve a more fulsome answer than what we have right now. We'll take a loo

Foreign Affairs committee  That is an interesting question. As to which ones should be, we would say most should be, but that's a different issue. From a quick search of databases, we found that Canada was minuscule. We looked at other countries that had a fairly large presence there and broke it down to

Foreign Affairs committee  I'll ask my colleagues to chip in on this one too, Mr. Chair, if you're agreeable. I think that in general the idea is not to hurt the people of Sudan, so that's your question about foodstuffs and that type of activity. You can paint with too broad a brush. For instance, if y

Foreign Affairs committee  First of all, anywhere, anytime we can, if it supports that position you just said, yes, we're there. In my opening statement I think that's what we've said, that Canada is quite prepared to participate in different fora, in different organizations, to do exactly that.

Foreign Affairs committee  David, do you want to answer that?

Foreign Affairs committee  I will ask Louise to comment on the aid issue.