Catherine Swift Quotations

There's no simple answer. We're certainly not going to be able to attract enough immigrants who can move in, buy a business and make a go of it, even though that's undoubtedly a partial solution.

The vacancy rate for the smallest companies---those with fewer than five employees---is four times that of the largest firms in the study.

If you have fewer jobs created and less of a boost to the economy overall, then that effect naturally filters out,

It touches everybody to some extent. Many businesses have travel as a component of the business, ... Everybody uses energy to some degree.

And the number one reason is fuel prices,

The growing concern with business input costs such as energy and insurance ... will start to hamper small firms' expansion and hiring plans if action isn't taken. The most obvious course of action would be to lower the overall tax burden to alleviate the pinch small businesses are feeling.

It's just not practical. Seventy-five per cent of businesses in this country have fewer than five employees.

It's a fairly permanent situation. You can always tough something out for a little while, but it's getting to the point that it's really factoring into people's medium to longer-term plans.