There are eight or 10 finance officials here to answer questions on a bill.
Again, for all the many people who are watching this meeting right now, I think it's important for them to understand that this bill is another omnibus budget bill from this government. It's 659 pages long. It has 468 clauses. This committee meets roughly only twice a week for two hours, so we need every possible moment to examine this document and/or ask the questions that people expect us to ask. We have all these excellent officials here today who have the answers to our questions, and now we've been stopped from asking them, over a self-centred, overbearing, centrally planned Liberal motion that basically tries to neuter our ability to ask questions about this massive document.
It's very, very disappointing, Mr. Chair, and I certainly echo the comments of all of my colleagues.
I think one of the things that the Liberal members.... Maybe because Mr. Turnbull is new to this committee, he's forgotten that more people voted for Conservatives in both the 2019 and the 2021 elections than for Liberals and that in fact they're not a majority government. They're a minority government, and they can't just dictate to the committee what it is we're going to study and when we're going to study it. That has to be worked out.
If there is some reason that they can't modify this motion to come to an acceptable arrangement, I think that's on them. They need to work in the spirit of collaboration and reach across the aisle, as Conservatives do every day, but they're just not willing to. They have deluded themselves into thinking that they're still a majority government, but they're not, and of course they won't be government much longer—everyone knows that—so they're bringing in these heavy-handed motions to try to map out the agenda for their government in their dying days to try to basically get through as much harmful legislation for Canadians as they possibly can.
I have a lot of questions. I have questions about the small business rebate. I have questions about the journalism tax rebate, the short-term rental adjustments, the underused housing tax and the alternative minimum tax. However, I'm being basically prevented from asking my questions of officials because of this heavy-handed motion.
Those are basically my comments, Mr. Chair. I think that Canadians watching will be as appalled as I am at the heavy-handed tactics of the Liberal members on this committee and will understand that they are not provided with the benefits of having their elected officials ask questions of finance officials about this 659-page omnibus budget.
Thank you, Mr. Chair.