Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
First of all, I want to thank Ms. Blaney for her support of Mr. Sarai's subamendment. I think we've essentially almost come back to where we started with having a letter—and a witness, potentially, if the letter doesn't provide a satisfactory result.
There are a couple of major benefits from this approach, and that's why I am speaking in favour of the adoption of the subamended amendment.
One is that it puts a whole lot less pressure on the letter because we have a fallback. While I went through at some length what we would want to see in a letter that might be put forward to supplant a witness, I don't think we need to be as prescriptive because we have the built-in safety valve of inviting the author of the letter to come here.
I would also like to address one of Mr. Richards' comments. He stated, in his rationale for opposing this amendment, that the Conservatives won't be agreeing to any further witnesses until we have heard from the ministers directly involved. I think that perhaps presents an excellent opportunity for the committee to break through this impasse. If the primary preoccupation of the Conservatives is to bring the relevant ministers before the committee, I don't think there is any disagreement on that. The disagreement is on the fishing expedition that follows.
In terms of the viva voce testimony of the relevant ministers, if that is the focus, I think there is a path to resolution here, and I'd be most interested in exploring that. I'm not sure that an in-session public meeting is the place to explore that, unless others feel differently. However, I would be quite happy to hear from my Conservative friends as to whether a piecemeal approach, one where we go forward with what we can agree upon and agree to park what we can't agree upon and argue about it later, if necessary.... That's basically the approach we took with this amendment, and we could it take with the overall motion.
I offer that as an olive branch.