The federal government has announced an ambitious goal of turning Canada into a centre of global innovation. Over the next year or so, it will develop a bold new innovation agenda to help achieve this objective. What should be the crucial elements of this agenda? And how much can changing government policies actually boost Canada’s innovation performance, which has been lamentably poor relative to those of peer countries? The IRPP hosted a working lunch with the author of an IRPP report on this topic, Andrei Sulzenko (former senior assistant deputy minister, Industry Canada), and commentators Hon. John Manley (president and CEO, Business Council of Canada); Ilse Treurnicht (CEO, MaRS Discovery District); and Iain Klugman (CEO, Communitech). The moderator of the event was president and CEO of the IRPP, Graham Fox.