I just repeat that there is absolutely no disagreement on this side that the first external witness will be the ambassador of Canada to China.
My experience may be different from others. I travelled to three countries in Africa last week and immediately upon arrival in each of those countries I had very good briefings by the heads of mission in those countries. Absolutely, we trust our heads of mission—ambassadors, high commissioners, chargés d'affaires—to do the work of briefing us on the ground.
However, before I left I had extensive briefings from departmental officials, those with desks in Global Affairs Canada, who brought up issues of consular affairs, international trade, investment, the issues I would be encountering so that I could have an effective trip on behalf of the people of Canada. I think that is the normal process that we engage in. We get written materials and have briefings from officials and then we have the heads of our missions do that work.
In a moment I am going to be presenting an amendment to the motion, but before I do that I want to take us back to the 40th Parliament. This is not the first time we have had a special committee established by the House on an international issue. The last time, in the 40th Parliament, an international committee was established to look at our mission in Afghanistan.
With all due respect to Ms. Blaney, we don't have Jack Harris here. His experience on that special committee, which lasted almost three years and wrote a number of reports, would be invaluable to our agenda subcommittee. I think his experience on that committee—and I was serving with him on another committee at the same time—and his understanding of the briefings, the role of expert witnesses and the roles of others who have differing opinions would be very helpful for us to consider at the agenda subcommittee.
We've just established the agenda subcommittee. I think we should use it. It needs to make some recommendations with respect to the timing of our meetings and the number of meetings we have per week. Remember, this is not a standing committee that follows the normal slots of (a), (b), (c) and (d) committees. We have to request our officials to appear. We have an ambassador who is in China. We want him to be here as soon as possible and we want to make the most effective use of his time and our time. This is something that we need to settle in to.
Parliament is just resuming next week. Most of us have other committee responsibilities. We want to get all of that fed into the agenda subcommittee so that every member can find a way to be their most effective in this committee. A meeting time and our meeting frequency are practical ways of working that I think would be best dealt with at the subcommittee on agenda. I just think it is an easier place than doing it here in this room.
I am going to suggest an amendment to Ms. Alleslev's motion. The first two lines are the same. However, we we would strike the words “on Monday, January 27, 2020”, and add this at the end so that the motion will be reading as such: “That the committee invite the Ambassador of Canada to the People's Republic of China, Mr. Dominic Barton, to appear in person before the committee for a two-hour televised meeting; that Mr. Barton be given 20 minutes to update the committee on the state of relations between Canada and the People's Republic of China; and that the remaining time be allotted for questions and comments from members of the committee; and that this meeting happen as soon as possible after the subcommittee has met and the full committee has appropriately been briefed by officials as determined by the committee, and subject to the scheduling by the clerk of the committee.”
If I can just speak to my amendment, I think we are keeping the spirit of Ms. Alleslev's motion to make sure we have as immediate a meeting with Mr. Barton as possible, that we do it subject obviously to scheduling but also subject to the work of the subcommittee getting together, determining and recommending to the committee what briefings would be appropriate, and that we do that within the next couple of weeks.
That's all. We are talking about a couple of weeks to make sure that we are organized. That's what I have to say.