Government Operations committee  No, that's not what I said, actually. I cited the example of a very tiny post office in a rural area whose clientele would regularly visit an urban area. So I guess on the surface it looks like a redundant outlet.

Government Operations committee  I guess there were two questions there. One was how we stand out from our competitors. There was something that I didn't 100% grasp, something to do with how we would treat our employees in comparison to how our competitors might treat theirs.

Government Operations committee  To stay competitive? Being located in York, Prince Edward Island is probably one of the top reasons why we're competitive. Our operating costs, our taxes, our labour rates, and everything else would be considerably higher if we were in Pacific Circle in Mississauga or somewhere

Government Operations committee  As Mr. MacAulay brought up today and in the previous session, people would like to have improved service, but they don't want to have to pay for it. The public's decision would be, “Yes, I like the service, but I don't want to pay for it; in fact I'm not very happy with the price

Government Operations committee  I think you would have to ask that of Deepak, not of me.

Government Operations committee  I'm trying to run our company, not Canada Post.

Government Operations committee  I'm concerned about the losses, because all I have to go on is that I'm approached by people like the president and those at the vice-president level of Canada Post, explaining to us that they are facing x number of losses, and this is why. They ask what contributions we have to

Government Operations committee  There is no other choice.

Government Operations committee  Yes.

Government Operations committee  No.

Government Operations committee  I don't spend a lot of time thinking about what they could be doing, but—

Government Operations committee  The FedEx SmartPost is probably the one that would affect us the most, and the one where we would probably offer a rather major change to one of our core business components.

Government Operations committee  Yes, it's interesting. I guess maybe because it's gardening and we're all a little folksy or something, but we're actually very good friends with all of our competitors, both in Canada and the U.S. That subject comes up all the time. You know, everybody has their frustrations,

Government Operations committee  The answer is not increasing prices. The answer is running the company more efficiently.

Government Operations committee  If it takes closing rural post offices, implementing community mail boxes, further mechanization of processing the mail, that's what needs to be done. Eventually, you'll price yourself out of the market. Canada Post has come very close a couple of times to pricing themselves ou