Mr. Chairman, before we begin, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that on the orders of the day, there are two notices of motion. Then, we are to hear from witnesses. Given the fact that at our last meeting there was a great deal of discussion on notices of motion that did not result in a vote—that can happen from time to time—I fear today's discussions may drag on and we may not be able to hear from the witnesses.
Some witnesses are from Quebec. They are agricultural producers. Out of respect, I would like us to invert our orders of the day. We could hear from the witnesses first and then discuss notices of motion.
As for the other scheduled witnesses representing the department, since they are from Ottawa, it is easier to connect with them. So, I would suggest we spend the first hour hearing from the agricultural producers on the matters we want to discuss and that we discuss the motions during the second hour.
I personally have nothing planned for tonight. If you want to go on until 2 a.m., that is not a problem for me, but at least, we will have heard from the agricultural producers who travelled here to present their testimony. If we don't have enough time to hear from the departmental officials, we could set aside some other time, outside of regular committee hours as we've done for Mr. Miller's witnesses, or we could add another hour to one of our regular meetings for that purpose.
If we were to divide the committee's time in half this way, we could meet the needs of all committee members.