Finance committee  We're very much for having less complex and fewer regulations. That's a pretty bald statement. We think there is a lot that can be done even in the near term by having a panel put together externally that would advise the Treasury Board Secretariat, to go through each of these ar

Finance committee  Yes, on this one, this is where we think that targeted review of the tax system needs to be put in place. I think a previous member of your standing committee raised that point about people being able to take advantage of going offshore. We think there has to be a level playing

Finance committee  On the skills side, there are some pages on that, and I won't bore you with them, but we tried to estimate for each job type what percentage of those jobs would be automated. Point number one is that no one is immune. I'm sure we won't have robots—and you can shut the computer of

Finance committee  Yes, to your point, we and others have done some surveys. I think one of the things you referred to was from a broader business point of view, three big issues, but two in particular. One is regulation. I think 61% of the respondents said that they thought there's a major issue i

Finance committee  That's a great question. We did talk about it. To be honest, I think we could put more of a spotlight on it because, as you mentioned, with all those categories, given our rapidly aging demographics, if we don't get as many Canadians participating in the workforce as possible,

Finance committee  We definitely feel strongly about that because our female participation rate had gone up and has flattened over the last while. Again, we think they are a source of talent that we need to have participate much more in the economy. The child care part is a very important part of t

Finance committee  Thank you. We do worry about innovation going offshore, if you will, into non-taxed regimes, though I think there's now more pressure around the world to try to be able to deal with that. We're seeing that in Europe in a very big way. We think there's a lot that could be done.

Finance committee  We think it's important that we be competitive, and that's within a bound. I don't think it has to be exact, but we have to be in the range. The U.S. tax reform has put some pressure in that regard, though again, I'm looking a comparison done by EY and KPMG of tax rates and that

Finance committee  I definitely think there's a perception like that, and maybe there's some lack of spotlight on some of the opportunities. This relates a bit to the second wave of recommendations on innovation. There were two elements there that we hope will also improve business investment. One

Finance committee  I also did a bit of background reading. I saw that you got nominated, I think, for the Golden Scissors award, which I liked, on regulatory reform. I think what we would say on this is that it is more about, frankly, that there are too many regulations, and regulations that pile

Finance committee  I do think, as you said, that even agrifood, which a lot of people don't think is a high-tech area, is very much on the leading edge. I don't want to make a blanket statement that all Canadian companies don't do this. There are some that do it extraordinarily well. It's just tha

Finance committee  Okay. As we get to the skill side, this is an area that we felt very strongly about in the growth council. We're worried about the technology change that's happening at a pace and a scale we haven't seen before. We think that in the order of 10% to 12% of Canadian jobs will be di

Finance committee  Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for being so flexible. My apologies for this being by video conference and for being in different parts of the world. You're very gracious to put up with this. In my opening statement, I would just say a couple of things. One, as you me

Finance committee  Right. I think the first thing is that there are not enough infrastructure projects being done; there simply aren't. That's the first point. The second point is that we think there's a benefit to the taxpayer of having more infrastructure being built. The third point I make is

Finance committee  That's a very good idea. Of 100,000 areas where there are differences, I think the demand, the desire for an infrastructure bank in the U.S. is probably the one area where there is commonality. As you know, the Obama administration tried but couldn't get it through Congress. They