Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
As I indicated earlier, I am sorry to see us having to vote on this motion. I understand what the parliamentary secretary is telling us, but in order to have balance of the kind he would like to see in today's meeting, I would point out that, according to the decision made on June 7, we needed to be focusing on the G8. Mr. Chairman, you have taken the trouble in the past to get in touch with us on less important issues to indicate changes. However—and I do not want to have to quote Marleau and Montpetit because it is not necessary—you should at least have contacted me. I do not necessarily want us to use a motion here. If you at least had the humility to admit to having made a mistake...
I feel that this motion is not a confidence motion. However, I think that we cannot allow ourselves to accept the process that has been initiated. If we accept this, it means that we will find out about the agenda through the clerk and that votes taken by the committee will be called into question. You should at least have contacted me to ask me whether the agenda could be changed, given that it was difficult to get hold of witnesses and a number of them were not available. But that was not done.
I will therefore be obliged to vote in favour of this motion, which is not a confidence motion. I want you to know that if you step down, it will be your decision and we will interpret it as a resignation, which I hope will not happen, by the way. I am sorry, but we cannot stand by and say nothing when this kind of decision is made. But if you agree to acknowledge that a mistake was made, we can reconsider. Up to now, you continue to say that your decisions were right. We on this side cannot support that assessment.