Let me address the objections raised by the Conservative members of the committee who have used some interesting words. I believe “spurious” and “fatuous” were two of the adjectives. Back at you, team.
I guess one could make that case with division 17 of part 3 in Bill C-60 where certainly I've had many constituents come to me expressing concern about the independence and the integrity of our crown corporations. Surely, a government that pretends to desire competence and expertise on economic matters would want to be assured that there is complete independence and integrity for our bank, the Bank of Canada. We didn't ask them to include these intrusions on crown corporations in their budget. Of course, it was unanticipated when we set the schedule for the finance committee. We are reacting to the inclusion of these provisions in Bill C-60, their latest omnibus budget bill.
We're also reacting to the fact that there is so little time given to this committee or any other committee to study the provisions of this bill. We believe that this is something that is fundamentally important to the integrity of our economic system and that we should make sure that our Bank of Canada is fully independent. We need to reassure ourselves of that. I would argue that if you look at our schedule carefully, which we have done, we have nothing planned for either June 11 or June 13, and we could in fact very well accommodate a further examination of these very important issues.
I submit that we do take the time and study this carefully because I'm sure Canadians would not be happy if they found that their government had in some way compromised the integrity or independence of their bank, especially during these insecure economic times.