Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I have a few preliminary observations in terms of procedures. I'm going to elaborate more on procedures, because this is the theme that caught my attention yesterday, with the various speakers and the motion we have before us.
For the life of me, I don't understand how we're giving precedence to this motion. I was present at the committee yesterday, and there were other motions to be considered. All of a sudden we called a quasi-important emergency meeting in less than 24 hours to discuss this motion, only because we weren't done with the motion of yesterday. These are my preliminary observations.
The second observation is the fact that we deferred Madame Gaudreau's motion. What is more striking to me is that.... I had the opportunity, being a new member, to finally sit down and look at this motion last night. I wanted to look at the details as to what the considerations were of bringing forward her motion. I glanced at it very quickly yesterday when we took the decision to defer, because there was a lot mentioned in that motion. I understand why my colleagues also were of the opinion that we needed to defer that particular motion.
I want to draw your attention, and the attention of my fellow colleagues, to paragraph 11 of that motion. I'm going to take the time to read it, because I think it's important. The motion has to do with setting up a special committee that would look into issues that were discussed in the previous mandate.
She requests:
That the committee continue all of the business of the following committees: the Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics; the Standing Committee on Finance; the Standing Committee on Official Languages....
—by the way, I sit on that committee, and we're sitting next Tuesday—
...and the Standing Committee on Government Operations and Estimates; and that the documents and evidence received by each of these committees be deemed to have been received by the said committee, including the documents provided on August 18 to the members of the Standing Committee on Finance....
Basically, my understanding is that she anticipates we are going to be requesting documents from each and every one of these individual committees, and then that these documents or evidence, or whatever documents or information we're going to get from these committees, will be given to the new committee that's going to be created. Interestingly enough, Conservative members yesterday decided to defer this motion, along with the Liberal members.
Then my colleague MP Barrett presented his motion. I read his motion again very carefully, too. I understand it differs from the motion that had been passed at this committee, of which I was not a member, and it is brought up again today. There seems to be an urgency to do this: why, I still don't understand, but we're pressing on this. When we say Liberal members are taking up time and we're discussing this.... To quote my colleague Mr. Barrett in the House this week, all members should get to speak, because it is an important pillar of democracy. We agree, colleague. We all need to speak.
I'm a new member on this committee. I think I'm more than entitled to look at documents, study documents, and if I have a point of view that differs from his or from any other colleague's, I should be given the opportunity to speak and to express that. It may not be one that he agrees with, but to be accused of speaking for the sake of filibustering.... Well, my response to him is this. He seems to want to be pushing this down our throats, plead that there is an urgency, when he also says, “You can filibuster all you want up until next week at all the meetings.” There is a statement being made here that this very same motion, or at least the request for documents or the pursuit of this, is going to continue in the next week's meetings.
I would like to submit the following supposition to my colleagues here today. If the same motion will be presented in each of the meetings that we'll have next week, including the language committee, as per Madame Gaudreau's motion, then why are we presenting the exact same request in all of these committees? What is the point of doing that?
We have a PROC committee that deals with House affairs, which can very simply deal with this request and the forthcoming requests that are going to be coming out next week. Why are we wasting the time of this committee, and possibly all other committees, on this repeated request, when it could be done by one committee that does just that? Why are we not having leaders of every party discuss this issue, come to some sort of an agreement and establish this new standing committee that will be able to look at this carefully and request all the necessary documents, rather than bring this to every committee?
If the motions or requests are not going to be the exact same requests.... By the way, I just want to make a little parenthesis: What if every committee that submitted this request comes out with different results, where there are amendments that are agreed to? Which one will we accept when we create this new standing committee: the motion that will have been passed at the ethics committee, or the motion that will have been passed at the languages committee, or the motion that will—