Thanks.
Going back to the issue of the proposal, I appreciate Mr. Poilievre's commentary. I enjoyed the job I had before politics. I felt most days that I was half decent at it.
There is no circumstance in the world where I would have committed to a binding decision minutes after receiving a motion, or even an hour after receiving whatever the suggestion would be, if I was engaged in another meeting during that time to consider it.
I'm not trying to be tricky. The reality of the next couple of hours or evening, whatever it might be, is that I'm going to be engaged in this meeting until this meeting is done. I have a few other obligations tonight. I think it would be a more productive use of time if I could work on trying to figure out whether we can work with this motion.
To Mr. Julian's point about being x number of hours per word, obviously that's silly. The reality is that had we had this motion a few hours before the meeting began, maybe we could have gotten somewhere. I didn't see it until the clerk circulated it during this meeting—I'm not trying to pull the wool over anybody's eyes.
If we can't agree to suspend until the next available slot—and I would invite House leadership of each of our parties to have a conversation to see whether another committee would yield time for us tomorrow—then we can continue to debate the subamendment. It will delay my consideration of the motion and some of the conversations I would otherwise have. However, I really am trying to use this as a helpful starting point. I think the Cabinet confidence piece is a significant movement from where we last left off.
If committee members want to go back to debating the subamendment for the evening, we can do that. I honestly believe it would be a far more productive use of time for me and others to consider what's been proposed and to see if it's something we can agree to in advance of the Thursday meeting.
I'll leave my comments there, Chair. If opposition members would agree to a suspension or adjournment, I think that's the best possible route so we can consider it. If not, it looks like we'll return the subamendment.