Natural Resources committee  Prior to 2003 there were issues related to the shut-off rods, the control absorbers. There was a study done by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. One was also done by Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. It took a look at quality assurance issues through the construction of the

Natural Resources committee  I will pick up on Mr. West's comment. I think that as we look at the MAPLE project now, there were a number of different factors that played into this, and it really wasn't until 2003 that the power coefficient issue emerged as another technical issue that needed resolution. It

Health committee  I think it's important to understand that we are not the reactor operator; we are not the reactor licensee in the world. What we do is we receive medical isotopes from reactors around the world, including the NRU reactor. The dialogue, in terms of restarting the NRU reactor, was

Health committee  What can be done today? I think we've talked a lot in this and other discussions about a communication protocol. We think that is important. I also mentioned that I think we need a national supply strategy to ensure that the NRU reactor does not go down again on an occasion su

Health committee  Nordion has a couple of business lines. One of them is what we would call our isotope business, where we sell molybdenum-99 and iodine-131. We also have a line of business that includes cobalt-60 sources and radiation systems for the sterilization of health care products.

Health committee  I'm sorry, I'm not able to disclose that. Our annual revenues at Nordion are about $290 million, which is publicly stated.

Health committee  A large percentage of it does, yes.

Health committee  It's really quite simple. As I mentioned earlier, we have backup supply agreements in place with our suppliers. Those backup agreements have pricing defined. So it's already pre-defined, well in advance, what we would pay for those isotopes and that is part of our normal business

Health committee  If I may, I would address the point I mentioned in my opening remarks. I think it goes back to the national isotope supply strategy for Canada. When we take a look at the pre-eminent position Canada has in the world because of research and development in nuclear technology, Canad

Health committee  As I mentioned, we supply to a radiopharmaceutical manufacturer. They are one of the two suppliers who supply back to Canada. Bristol-Myers Squibb and Covidien are the suppliers of radiopharmaceutical products to Canada. We supply Bristol-Myers Squibb with the medical isotopes th

Health committee  There were a number of questions, and I will try to address them in order. First of all, I wouldn't call a 50% supply a monopoly. We are a supplier. We do have--

Health committee  We're really not privy to the government communications, so we don't know what might have transpired or actually did transpire in that area.

Health committee  We thought we had taken our steps to inform government through the meeting with Natural Resources Canada. Again, not being privy to the communications, we did not go beyond that at that point in time. However, on December 5 we did receive calls from several government departments

Health committee  Not in those early days. No, we did not.

Health committee  No, we did not.