In that case, I'm going to take the opportunity to address both. I think you would have to find me in order in doing so, because in the history of this committee the practice has been to shut off debate by that particular tactic, and that seems likely to occur again. Certainly it is possible to begin again.
I'll start by noting the obvious thing. The Bloc Québécois submitted 45 proposed witness names, the Liberal Party submitted 43 proposed witness names, the New Democrats proposed 17 witnesses, and the Conservative Party proposed 11 witnesses. Every single witness proposed by the Conservative Party has been disallowed.
We haven't had the opportunity to hear a rationale for the basis on which members of the committee supported the chair. We did hear the chair's rationale. The obvious concern I had with that--this is relevant to the discussion under way as we look at other witnesses--is that these were people whose names were submitted with some information when they were given.
By way of example, there was Libby Davies, MP for Vancouver East; Phyllis Loke was the official agent for Ms. Davies in the 2006 election. These, of course, are not all the attributes these individuals have. They are individuals with many facets to their personalities, their professions, their opinions, and so on, some of which could have been relevant to the matter under way, particularly in a comparison between their practices, which in many cases, and even the cases listed here, were identical to those Elections Canada disallowed in the case of the Conservative candidates. That's the relevance.
At any rate, members might have tried to question them about matters outside the subject matter of the debate. That could have been ruled out of order. Their commentary on the similarities between their practices--or dissimilarities, as the case may be--would have shed some light on the disallowance by Elections Canada of the election expenses of various Conservative candidates. That would have made them very germane indeed.
I notice that you didn't disallow Mr. Sears, who was the only one submitted without some description beside his name. Mr. Martin has done so, I assume because one of the features of Mr. Sears--who, like all the other people on the list, is a person with many aspects to his personality, his professional life, his interests, and so on--is that he has gone on record as regarding these proceedings as being inappropriate. This fits in with a certain pattern of behaviour of the members on the opposite side of this committee, which is to disallow any testimony that is not in favour of the position they want. Mr. Mayrand, for example, was dismissed when he was saying things that were not in accordance with their narrative.
Mr. Sears, I can guarantee, would not have been in accordance with their narrative, and I suspect that Libby Davies or Rick Limoges or Jean-Paul Marchand, a Bloc Québécois candidate in the 2000 general election, also would not have given testimony that fits in with their narrative, but it would have as long as you as chair were able to steer them in the appropriate direction--that is, only focusing on responding to questions that deal with the consistency of the application of the law to their party and their campaigns and the Conservative Party and various Conservative candidates in the 2006 election. It would have been entirely germane. These are pretty significant points.
Three experts on election laws were proposed by the Liberal Party, and Madam Jennings defended their presence. It's not for me to say whether they have germane comments to make. One assumes they probably would. I'm at pains to figure out why they are any more qualified or any less qualified than Mr. Sears, who Mr. Martin's motion would propose removing from the list. All of them are people who deal with the process. There's no distinction that I can determine, other than when I made a comment about Mr. Sears' personality, Mr. Martin said he has a terrible personality. Well, Mr. Martin's personal dislike for Mr. Sears does not constitute a reason not to have him here.