Okay.
The second matter I want to deal with is in regard to material. We will receive some material. Some of it will be presented to us confidentially, one would assume, and it would be appropriate to keep that in camera. But my preference is very much, where possible, to have any items treated as public documents. The public has a right to know what we are doing whenever some kind of confidentiality is not requested by, for example, the commissioner when she submits materials to us. I would like to make items, where possible, public, starting with the submission Madam Dawson has given us. By referring to it right now, I'm effectively making it a public document. I'd like to treat things that way, unless there's any reason for confidentiality, in which case we'll treat them as confidential documents.
The next item I want to deal with is the question of dealing with any witnesses we have. We're likely to have only one witness, I expect, and that is the commissioner, but that could change.
This committee is different from any previous committee I've been on in that there is no government member other than me, the chairman. Members will be aware that I was opposed to this committee structure, because it would make it impossible for a government member to deal with witnesses, or to vote, should there be any disagreement. Therefore, I am going to propose, in dealing with our witnesses, an order for questioning. This is something we can't simply cross from the parent committee, because that has a different structure. There are more members on that committee. The order would be simply that we start with the official opposition. We then go to the next largest party, the Bloc Québécois. We then go to the New Democrats. I will reserve the right to ask questions as the final questioner.
I'm hoping to do this by consensus. We've had consensus on other subcommittees on similar matters. We dealt with the code of ethics for MPs entirely by consensus. We had no votes at all, and I was very pleased with that. I would like, where possible, to continue that approach. If there's a need for voting, I will just alert members of the committee to the fact that I will exercise my right to vote and will not regard the fact that I hold the chair as making me ineligible to vote. That's not something I will regard as being subject to challenge, although if anybody finds that objectionable, they will have the option of voting non-confidence.
Go ahead, Madam Jennings, please.
